Every Day Is Halloween
by SplendentGoddess
Summary: As a kid I believed in ghosts, but adults usually stop believing in such things. I thought *I* had, until one Halloween when my friend Eri talked me into some 'harmless fun' that changed my life forever. My name is Kagome Higurashi, and this is my ghost story.
1. I see dead people

Blanket Disclaimer:

Inuyasha, and the characters therein, are the property of Rumiko Takahashi. I am in no way affiliated with Takahashi, or VIZ Productions.

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Hello, and welcome to my tale. I won't bore you with too many details before we get to the good stuff. My name is Kagome Higurashi, and I'm of Japanese descent though I'm a Southern California girl through and through. I know a little bit about Japanese mythology, but there aren't any mythological creatures like youkai in the story I'm about to tell you. That's not to say this story is lacking a supernatural flair, though. There's nothing like a good Japanese ghost story, right?

But first, more about me. Let's see... I'm twenty years old and have a fourteen year old brother named Souta. Our father died when Souta was just a baby and our mom had to move back in with her parents, but we pulled through. Grandma's since passed away, so back home it's just Souta, Mama and Gramps. I also have a cousin around my age named Sango, my father's brother's daughter. She's cool people, but isn't in this story. I've since moved out of the house and onto campus; I'm a junior in college, studying to be a therapist. That's how I met Eri, my roommate, and her friends Yuka and Ayumi, who are also dormmates of ours at the university. We've unofficially formed our own little clique, though don't ask me how it happened. I guess all us Japanese-American girls have to stick together, right? No matter how annoying they get at times...

Did I say that out loud?

Anyway, I hang out with them almost exclusively, which usually means I get roped into doing things I wouldn't ordinarily do, which brings me to the story that's about to unfold. It all started when Eri suddenly told me, just _one _day before Halloween mind you, that _she _thought it would be the 'bestest, most funest' idea in the world to go to our town's old, run down cemetery, where the bodies of some people from this gruesome horror story that's been passed around campus for the last fifty years are buried, and I don't know, hold a séance or something. I was only half paying attention once I realized her plan involved me _not _getting to party on campus the following night. I'm studying to be a shrink, not a nun, and I'd wanted to _party_, damn it. I told her no. I know I did. But yet, somehow, come the following night there I was, meandering through a century old cemetery, and that's where my story begins.

I still remember it like it was yesterday...

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~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~

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Chapter one: I see dead people...

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_I can't believe I let Eri talk me into this_ ... I thought, as I held my Mini Maglite with trembling fingers.

I was shaking because I was _cold_, not because I was scared. Certainly not. Not that traipsing through a century old graveyard in the middle of the night was my idea of a fun girls' night out, but I most certainly wasn't _scared_.

"Ooohh, this is going to be the best Halloween ever!" Eri squealed enthusiastically as she skipped and danced ahead of the rest of us, leading us all to our destination.

I rolled my eyes at her antics.

I'm twenty years old, for crying out loud! My idea of the 'best Halloween ever' includes the three Cs: campus, cocktails, and catsuits. Strap on a few action movie accessories and I'm ready to sexily save the world, kicking evil's ass while simultaneously showing off my fabulous curves. It's my favorite kind of getup, since I don't go for the cliché that is the ridiculously short 'school uniform' skirt. Just because like 90% of anime girls are drawn wearing panty flashers doesn't mean I have to dress like that in real life. And just because I don't take my fashion tips from Easy Access 101 doesn't mean I'm a prude, either. You can be covered up and still show it off at the same time. College dorm parties are the shit, and I _had _had plans for that year's Halloween that involved borrowing my cousin Sango's homemade 'demon slayer' costume and doing myself up like a post-apocalyptic bad ass, but alas, instead of spending that moment in time squeezed into form-fitting black leather while drinking something blue through a funnel, I'd instead somehow found myself wandering through the cemetery with my roommate and her friends, freezing my butt off in an unimaginative pair of jeans and a black graphic tee from Hot Topic.

"Do you think the stories are true?" Ayumi asked me as we walked, pulling me from my thoughts.

She clutched her jacket a little tighter around herself as she waited for my answer, making me rue leaving my hoodie in the car.

"Do I think Kikyou and Inuyasha really existed, and that their tragic deaths really happened?" I asked in reply, answering her question with a question. "Yes, actually, it _is_ a true story." I verified without hesitation. "I looked it up yesterday."

You better _believe _I'd looked it up. As soon as Eri'd convinced me to participate in this little adventure of hers I'd spent the rest of the day doing online research on the murders. I'd never really cared to know if the story was true or not before then, but there was no way in all the hells I was actually going to waste my Halloween night playing this little game with her if the people in question had never even existed, so I'd quickly become a woman on a mission. Fortunately, fifty year old murders weren't really that hard to look up if you were tenacious enough. I'd found more than one website talking about the history of our university that'd mentioned the horrific deaths at least in passing. I'd even verified with a couple of phone calls that their murderer was still alive and still behind bars.

"But do I think that the ghost of Kikyou is going to show herself when we 'summon' her...?" I added then, snorting. I didn't try to conceal my amusement at the absurd notion. "I thought we were _college _juniors. High school is over. We may as well say 'Kikyou' three times in front of a mirror."

That statement made Yuka giggle, and I got the distinct impression that she didn't believe in the supernatural aspect of the story, either, but had agreed to go along with Eri's plan simply because she hadn't had anything better to do. I knew she usually took her little sister Trick-or-Treating, and that that year her 'little sister' had announced she was too old for Trick-or-Treating and was instead spending the night at a friend's slumber party.

_Probably saying 'Kikyou' three times in front of a mirror_ ... I thought, amusing myself as I chuckled out loud. If Yuka or Ayumi wondered what I was laughing at, they didn't ask.

Eri wasn't paying us any attention, the hardcore believer determinedly shining her flashlight from headstone to headstone as we walked along, searching out the specific grave she was looking for.

"Well, I don't know about ghosts, but it's super messed up, what happened back then. I actually wish it weren't a true story." Ayumi said after a moment, bringing my thoughts back around to the details of the horrific event in question.

They're details that every student at our university knows by heart.

The story goes that fifty years ago, on Halloween night, a campus party at our university turned into a major blood bath when this guy named Naraku, who was super jealous of the happy lovers Inuyasha and Kikyou because he wanted Kikyou all for himself, decided to go completely mental and in a fit of 'if I can't have her no one can' he brutally murdered Kikyou in cold blood. The kicker, though, was that he had somehow managed to find out what Inuyasha's costume was going to be, which was incidentally the Phantom of the Opera, so it'd included a face mask, and so he'd dressed up in that exact same costume and somehow managed to take Inuyasha's place by Kikyou's side for a few minutes. Rumors say Naraku had a couple of buddies detain Inuyasha on his way back from the bathroom. They were both around the same build, both with long black hair the same length, and so with the face mask it made sense that you wouldn't be able to tell them apart.

So there Naraku and Kikyou were, strolling along, Kikyou believing she was with her boyfriend, when suddenly he produced a knife and stabbed her in the heart. Inuyasha's said to have arrived on the scene too late to save Kikyou's life, or even just have a final moment with the dying girl, and supposedly according to eyewitnesses she died believing that Inuyasha had killed her, calling Naraku by Inuyasha's name as she demanded to know why he had done it. Inuyasha of course immediately went crazy with grief once he got there and then immediately went after Naraku, who had been in some kind of shock himself and hadn't fled the scene yet, just staring down at Kikyou's body, the knife still in his hand. They got into a violent brawl, fighting over the knife, until they both ended up with serious wounds, Inuyasha more so than Naraku. He bled out before the paramedics arrived, and it's said he died moaning Kikyou's name over and over, apologizing for his inability to protect her. The doctors were able to save Naraku's life, but with that many eyewitnesses it was an open and shut case and he's still in prison to this day for the double homicide, but it's little consultation, and now, Kikyou's ghost supposedly haunts both our school and the graveyard, seeking vengeance. I've even heard that the house where she used to live is haunted, too, her spirit going back home for some reason or another. Those kinds of details can't be found in any official reports, of course, but the legend that this tragedy has become on campus seems to grow in intensity each and every year.

It got me thinking, if I were ever brutally murdered at a college Halloween party, would I rather haunt the college, my family home, or the graveyard? Though then again, why choose? A ghost could do whatever they wanted, right?

Yeah right.

When I'd first heard the story my freshman year I'd thought back then that, while it was probably based on truth, a lot of the details had also probably been warped throughout the years to make the whole thing sound worse than it really was. The way they'd hyped up Kikyou's supposed appearances on campus, especially around the holiday, with nothing happening that I'd ever seen, I'd started to doubt the legitimacy of the Halloween connection altogether, figuring that that part of the story was probably just folklore. To learn the day before this little venture into the unknown that the majority of the details surrounding their deaths really _were_ accurate had surprised me, but at that time that hadn't meant I was suddenly convinced that all of the ghost stories associated with Kikyou's murder were also true. At that time I'd been thinking that it was going to take a whole lot more than fifty years of accurate event recounting to convince me that we were dealing with anything paranormal.

I was pulled from my musings by the sound of Eri's voice suddenly shouting, "This way!"

Yuka and Ayumi immediately jogged to catch up to Eri's position at her summons; I just rolled my eyes again.

_Come next Halloween, since I'll be twenty-one and finally able to order drinks in an actual nightclub, my ass is __so__ hitting Santa Monica Blvd., with or without Sango's AniCon costume_... I thought, slamming my eyes shut in surprise and shielding them with my free hand when somebody's bright flashlight beam suddenly hit me square in the face.

"Kagome, are you coming?" I heard Yuka's voice ask, and I grumbled a reply of "Yeah, yeah, yeah..." as I made my way over to where the rest of them were standing.

Eri frantically waved her free arm at me in a beckoning fashion as I neared, shining her flashlight beam at a specific headstone.

Glancing down at what was written, I felt the hairs on my arms stand up a little, although at the time I'd convinced myself it was just the cold. I'd already known she had been a real person, after all. But even so, to be in her presence was still...unnerving. I hadn't realized how much it would affect me until that very moment. There, illuminated by Eri's flashlight beam, was none other than Kikyou Takahashi's gravestone. It was a very surreal moment, coming face to headstone with the legend herself. The dates carved into the stone's surface were the final confirmation; she had indeed died on Halloween, precisely fifty years ago, at age twenty.

"This is definitely the right Kikyou..." Eri said with a tone akin to wonder in her voice, Yuka and Ayumi both nodding silently with semi-frightened looks on their faces.

_Oh please_...

Whatever unease I'd started to feel had immediately been wiped away by their expressions. I couldn't believe they were actually falling for the hocus pocus. I mean okay, so Kikyou really was a real person, and we'd found her grave, but they were looking like they'd expected to see a hand burst its way up through the soil at any given moment or something.

I had to liven the mood...pun intended.

"Ooo_Ooooo_..." I hummed in a ghostly sing-song voice. "I am the ghost of Halloween past..." I said with a chuckle, just to lighten things up.

It worked, for the most part, as Yuka and Ayumi both chuckled along with me, while Eri suddenly became the one looking nervous, as if I were going to anger Kikyou's spirit.

"Kagome!" she hissed, as if trying to keep her voice down. "Be respectful."

I snapped my stance tight, standing at attention, and saluted, which made Yuka and Ayumi both laugh a little harder. Eri also cracked a grin despite herself, and shaking her head at me in amusement, she then swung her backpack off her shoulders, took a seat on the grass at Kikyou's right, and began digging through her bag.

"Everyone into position." she said, as she gathered her things.

"Pardon me..." said to no one as I wide-stepped over Kikyou's grave to get to the other side, having a seat opposite Eri, Kikyou's headstone diagonally to her left and to my right.

Chuckling a little more at my antics, Yuka and Ayumi both took seats beside us as well, Yuka to my left and Ayumi across from her, at Eri's right. If you made Kikyou's headstone the top point, then you could've sketched out a five-pointed star between us all. The positions were intentional; just one more thing for me to roll my eyes at.

Glancing at Kikyou's headstone while Eri worked, my eyes softened, my heart truly going out to the girl. It was legitimately horrific, what had happened to her back then.

_But just because she died such a tragic death doesn't mean her ghost appears when summoned, or that she's doomed to forever wander the Earth in limbo, unable to find peace from her belief that her lover betrayed her_...I thought then, still convinced that all the spooky mumbo jumbo was nothing more than generations of students being dumb and trying to scare one another.

After all, even 'Bloody Mary' had been a real person at one point in time.

Thinking about what Kikyou's legend had become in that moment had my mind wandering over in the boyfriend's direction, as I glanced around aimlessly in the dark, wondering if Inuyasha's grave was anywhere close by. I felt it was a shame that nobody had ever seemed to think about poor Inuyasha over the last five decades. Sure, we all knew he hadn't really killed Kikyou, and it most definitely was tragic that Kikyou had died believing that he had, but what about how Inuyasha had died _knowing _that Kikyou had died believing he'd killed her? Knowing that Naraku had just _murdered _his girlfriend and he hadn't been able to prevent it? Hadn't been able to _protect_ her? _I_ hadn't thought it very fair that history was only remembering him in passing while Kikyou became a star.

I was pulled from my wandering thoughts as Eri said my name.

"Here, Kagome, you can help take pictures." she said, leaning forward on her knees and left hand, her right hand outstretched across Kikyou's grave to pass me her digital camera. I leaned forward as well to reach for it, repressing my desire to sigh as I took it and sat back down. Turning it on, I noted the full battery charge.

Glancing down over the space between us at Eri's handiwork, I had to hand it to the girl. She'd really gone all out for the occasion.

"Wow, you take this kind of thing seriously, huh?" I asked, chuckling a bit although honestly, I was also a little impressed.

Sitting on the grass between us, on Kikyou's grave at approximately where her chest should be, was an arrangement of five short white candles, which would've again formed a five-pointed star if you traced a line between them all, the top one pointing towards Kikyou's tombstone. Lying within the center of the would-be pentagram was a framed 8x10 photograph of Kikyou herself, which I recognized from my online research as an enlarged photocopy of her high school yearbook photo. Apparently, while I'd been doing research the day before, Eri had also been doing her own preparations.

Staring at the photo for a moment longer, I'd felt something stir within me. She'd been a very pretty girl. Also Japanese-American, her hair was long and straight, her expression proud and serious. She'd been going places, before it'd all been ripped away from her in a single moment of horror. An almost overwhelming sadness started to come over me as I thought about it, for both her plight as well as Inuyasha's, and so looking away from her picture then, I focused back on what Eri was doing.

Watching her light the candles one by one, I thought back to my conversation with her the day before, as she'd expressed her desire to come do this. She'd said she wanted to come to the cemetery because that way it would just be us, instead of at our school where there were bound to be multiple groups of people also trying to summon her. Idiots drunk off their asses and thinking that talking to Kikyou was just a game. Eri was a believer, and she thought Kikyou's spirit really was still around, and also really in pain because of how she'd died. She'd said she figured that the _last _place Kikyou probably wanted to be was on campus on Halloween night, and that she'd most likely be at her grave, plus with the ancient, spiritual connotations of All Hallow's Eve, the cemetery was the best place to make contact with her, anyway. I'd supposed that that made a small amount of sense, not that I'd believed we were actually going to make contact, mind you. Eri had also said that since all of the people involved were Japanese that we were the best people for the job, that Kikyou would probably feel the most comfortable talking to us, since back in the '60s racial segregation was more prominent. That made sense, too, if you thought about it, although honestly I'd thought at the time that Eri was just grasping at straws, coming up with anything as an excuse.

As I'd thought about it in that moment, though, as I watched her light the final candle, I'd hypothesized that the race thing was probably why Naraku had been obsessed with Kikyou to begin with, at least in part. She'd probably been the only Japanese girl at our school at the time, or the most desirable one in his mind, at least. I'd also found out during my research the day before that Inuyasha had actually been half Japanese with an American father, his parents originally from Hawaii, and so Naraku had probably thought he wasn't _good _enough for Kikyou. Naraku and Kikyou had also both been internment camp babies, their parents having to struggle for a time after the war, and Inuyasha's family had been spared that experience; it was probably yet one more thing that Naraku had thought meant that he and Kikyou were better for each other. It was just my own personal theory, of course, but it did make a small amount of sense, you know, from a crazy man's perspective.

It made a hell of a lot more sense than coming to a graveyard in the middle of the night just because you wanted to talk to a 'real life' ghost. No contradictions there. But Eri's fascination with ghosts notwithstanding, the spirit world isn't a damn petting zoo. If I'd have actually believed at the time that Kikyou's ghost _was _still around then I would've probably told Eri that we should just leave her the hell alone, though of course looking back on it I'm glad I hadn't, but at the time I'd honestly only been thinking to humor my roommate. I'd been thinking that nothing was going to happen.

How wrong I was.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

With everything setup and ready to go, Eri took out and turned on a small digital voice recorder, speaking into it briefly like they do on Ghost Hunters and other such paranormal 'reality' shows. She told it the date and time, and our location, and then sat it down on the ground in front of the candles, opposite the headstone.

I was just glad the four of us were sitting too far apart to hold hands, or I was sure she would've asked us to do so in that moment.

"We are here on this sacred night seeking an audience with the ghost of Kikyou Takahashi." she said then, the expression on her face as serious as ever as she addressed the unknown powers that be, the rest of us trying not to giggle. "Kikyou, are you here with us? If you are here with us please give us a sign of your presence."

The wind picked up ever so slightly, making the candles' flames dance around a bit harder for a brief moment.

"If that was you we thank you for your answer." Eri immediately replied, not missing a beat.

_Oh brother_... I mentally groaned, before remembering I was supposed to be taking pictures. Anything to distract myself from watching just how seriously Eri was taking the whole thing.

"Kikyou, we have brought with us a device that will help us to hear you if you can speak to us. If you can say something, please speak up as loudly as you can into the small device sitting before the candles."

I couldn't help myself.

"Your mother sucks cocks in Hell..." I grumbled low.

Yuka snorted a laugh, but Eri's unamused glare shut her up just as fast.

"Kagome, this is supposed to be serious." she scolded me next.

"I thought this was supposed to be _fun _and _the best Halloween ever_..." I replied tartly.

"She does have a point." Yuka stated, coming to my defense.

"You guys..." Ayumi suddenly spoke up, earning our attentions as she showed us the screen of her iPhone. She had also been taking pictures. "What's this?" she asked, showing us a picture of the darkened graveyard behind Yuka and me with what looked like a blueish out of focus blob in the bottom left corner.

"A blueish out of focus blob?" I provided.

"It's probably just lens flare from one of our flashlights, or maybe a bug flew in front of the lens or something." Yuka said, shrugging.

Ayumi frowned, turning her phone back around to face herself again. She stared at the photo for a moment, biting her lower lip.

"Shall we continue?" Eri asked, addressing all of us.

"Yeah..." Ayumi answered, putting her phone back into camera mode, taking more pictures.

I started clicking away again too with the camera Eri'd handed me, just taking random pictures of the area all around us. So far all of the shots on my screen had looked perfectly normal.

"Kikyou, if you are still here with us, can you please give us another sign of your presence?"

Nothing.

"Kikyou, if you are here with us, please do something that will let us know beyond a shadow of a doubt that it is you."

Nothing.

Eri sighed, looking a bit disappointed. I couldn't help myself; she's my friend, after all.

"How about we try provoking her?" I asked then, in part to cheer her up by playing along instead of trash-talking the fact that nothing was happening, although another part of me was honestly a little anxious to hurry up and get the whole thing over and done with.

If something was actually going to happen then I'd wanted it to _happen _already. Otherwise, if the night was going to be a total bust, then I'd wanted Eri to realize it soon enough for me to maybe still have time for some fun back at the dorms. It was only around ten o'clock, after all. Plenty early.

I didn't wait for Eri's answer before I spoke back up again.

"Hey, _Kikyou_..." I began, raising my voice. It's not like anybody else was around to overhear me making an idiot of myself. I could live with Yuka's teasing. "Aren't you upset about how you died? _I _sure as hell would be. Naraku claimed to love you, and then he just up and _murdered _you because you loved _Inuyasha_. I bet you never saw _that_ coming. Bet you thought Naraku was a good friend, huh?"

"But Kikyou thinks _Inuyasha_ killed her." Ayumi pointed out.

I just shrugged.

"That's what she thought as she died, but if her ghost actually _is _still around then don't you think she would've learned the truth by now? Besides, even if she is still trapped in that hatred like the stories claim, I'm not going to play along and lie to her, unjustly bashing Inuyasha's memory in the process. Wouldn't that piss off _Inuyasha's _ghost? Somebody's got to think about _his _feelings, 'cause if Kikyou's spirit really _is_ still around then I bet his is, too."

"She's got another point." Yuka chimed in.

"Thank you." I replied with a nod, sending her a playful grin that she returned with a wink, the two of us silently communicating our lack of belief and our amusement.

I continued, then, snapping random photos as I spoke.

"You were only _twenty _years old. You had your _whole life _ahead of you and he _stole it away_. For what? Why? _Why?! _That's not how you're supposed to treat the woman you love. Hey, Kikyou! I'm talking to you! Aren't you upset that you were _murdered?!" _

A large gust of wind rose up out of nowhere and snuffed out all five candles. Honestly, I chalked it up to Southern California weather, but the look on Eri's face. _Priceless_...

Giddily feeling like luck was on my side, I kept going.

"Good...looks like I got your attention." I said, setting the camera in my lap for a moment as inspiration struck and I began unscrewing the end of my Mini Maglite _just_ enough so that the light went off. Eri wasn't the only one who watched the Syfy network.

"Now, Kikyou, I've got this flashlight setup so that if you twist the end only the _tiniest _bit the light'll go on or off..."

I proceeded to demonstrate, then sat the flashlight down on the grass beside the voice recorder, facing away from the headstone, while Eri shakily relit the candles. I ignored her fluster. She'd wanted a Halloween to remember and I was going to try my damnedest to give her one.

"So I want you to turn it on for me. Think you can do that?" I asked 'Kikyou' then. "If you're really here with us, then I want you to twist the head of this flashlight until the light comes back on."

It only took maybe five seconds after I said that before the light actually came back on, much to my surprise but also joy.

_Well I'll be_... I thought, pleased with myself, not having been sure if it was going to work or not. I'd been mentally preparing myself for a suspenseful moment or two before fate regretfully called my bluff, Eri getting disappointed again when nothing else happened. Instead, as the light came back on Eri stared, wide eyed, but with an unmistakable grin tugging at the ends of her lips. She looked like a kid in a candy store

Ayumi gasped, fumbling with her phone for a moment in her surprise, her eyes wide as well but definitely less enthusiastic.

Yuka, meanwhile, shot me a playfully accusative glare, as if accusing me of staging it but while also assuring me that she wasn't going to rat me out, finding amusement in the others' reactions. I tried to send her an innocent look back, letting her know that I hadn't really done anything on purpose, but I don't think she believed me.

Eri regained her composure in that moment and took the reins of our 'investigation'.

"Kikyou, if that was you, can you turn the light back off again?" she asked, while simultaneously setting up her own flashlight the same way, twisting the head until the connection was just barely in the off setting, only the slightest twist needed to turn the light on or off. "We need to know that that was you, so if you want to take this opportunity to communicate with us, you have to let us know that you're really here and that we really are talking to you. Please turn the light back off again to show us that you're here and that you understand."

Not really expecting the light to go back out again, I mentally started counting, _one-one-thousand, two-one-thousand_... It literally only took two seconds for the flashlight to turn back off. So much for thinking that I might not have made the connection loose enough and that it'd merely reconnected for that reason.

"Shit...what the hell?" Yuka asked then, finally starting to take things a bit seriously, as was I. Turning my head to meet her eyes I muttered, "You got me."

"Okay, good, that's good..." Eri said, continuing as if Yuka and I hadn't said anything. She then proceeded to place her own flashlight down on the grass, on her side of the voice recorder, so that the voice recorder was in the middle of our two flashlights, each flashlight facing away from the headstone.

I picked Eri's camera back up, and then looked across Kikyou's grave to where Ayumi sat, her iPhone still gripped tightly in her hands.

"Ayumi, keep taking pictures..." I said then, mostly to give the spooked girl a task to focus on, as I fiddled with my own borrowed camera. "I'm switching to video." I said, putting Eri's Kodak into camcorder mode.

"We're going to try and ask you some 'yes' or 'no' questions now, okay Kikyou?" Eri asked, getting no immediate reaction. She kept going. "The flashlight closest to me will be _yes_, and the flashlight closest to Kagome, the one you've already turned on and off, will be _no_, do you understand? If you understand, then light up my flashlight, the _yes_ flashlight."

It lit up.

"Okay, good. Now can you turn it back off again?"

It went off.

"No freakin' way..." Yuka muttered, sounding truly perplexed.

"Looks legit to me." Ayumi answered, clearly trying to be brave although it was obvious she was really starting to feel uncomfortable.

I mused that if Kikyou's apparition had suddenly appeared in that moment Ayumi probably would've pulled a 'Casper' and jumped up stuttering 'A g-g-g-ghost!' before running away. The thought made me smirk a bit, although I still had to admit that the flashlight thing was intriguing. Even though it had originally been my idea I hadn't really expected it to _work_.

_Maybe there's something to this whole paranormal thing, after all_... I thought then, seriously doubting that any of us were actually turning the lights on and off with our own minds.

Lying about moving the pointer on a Ouija board was one thing, but while I _did _believe the human mind was capable of great feats I wasn't so sure we could stare at a loose flashlight and 'will' the light to turn on and off on command. So barring it being some crazy-ass coincidence, the power flow connecting and disconnecting at random because the connectors were at that _perfect _sweet spot of looseness, I had actually been leaning towards a supernatural explanation in that moment. What other explanation _was_ there? On a TV show you could crop it in editing to make it _look _like the light was immediately turning on and off even if there was really a five-minute wait or more after each question and it'd really just been from an arcing connector, but this was real life, in front of our faces. To quote Sherlock Holmes, when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

A vague childhood memory briefly started to come to mind in that moment, but I shook my head to clear it and refocus my attention on where I was and what I was doing as Eri began speaking to Kikyou again.

"Kikyou, are you still angry about how you died?" she asked.

The 'yes'flashlight went on...and back off again a few seconds later without Eri even having to ask. Smart ghost. Usually on those types of shows they always have to coax it into turning the light back off again before asking the next question, which had always made me wonder how long it was _actually _taking the light to go on and off, and if it really _was_ a trick in the editing and in reality the light was turning on and off at random.

I'd always wanted to try the flashlight trick myself at home, just to see if it'd actually flicker on and off by itself if loosened _just_ right, but I'd never gotten around to actually doing the experiment. In that moment I'd really wished I had. The whole thing _could_ have still just been a crazy coincidence, like with the wind earlier, and so in that moment I made the executive decision to deduce once and for all whether we were _actually_ dealing with a real ghost or not. I was open to the possibility, but I wasn't going to just blindly believe without solid evidence.

"Kikyou, I'm going to ask you five questions just to make sure you're _really _here and talking with us, so some will have _yes _answers, and some will have _no _answers, and I want you to answer all of them correctly, understand?" I said, earning a glare from Eri but I didn't care.

She opened her mouth to say something, probably to warn me about pissing Kikyou off and losing our connection with her, but before she could even say anything the 'yes'flashlight went back on and off again. She closed her mouth with an audible click of teeth, a look of surprise on her face, and I smirked, sending her a playfully superior look for having gotten my way before nodding my head in respect towards the flashlights.

"Thank you." I said to the flashlights, just to be courteous, just in case, before starting with my series of questions. "Is your full name Kikyou Takahashi?"

**Yes.**

"Did you die in a car accident?"

**No.**

"Did you die on Christmas Eve?"

**No.**

"Were you stabbed to death?"

**Yes.**

"Were you and Inuyasha dressed up as Christine and the Phantom from The Phantom of the Opera?"

**Yes.**

I just sat there, completely dumbfounded.

_Well shit_... I thought, unsure of what to say or do next.

"Satisfied?" Eri asked suddenly, not in a rude or sarcastic tone of voice, but instead with a poorly suppressed chortle as _she _gave _me _a playfully superior look, her eyes sparkling merrily. She'd known I hadn't been a believer. The look in her eyes said _'Ha! In your face!' _

I deserved it.

I still stuck my tongue out at her, though.

Giggling, she got back to her own questions, then, and I let her, my mind wandering again as I continued to film the 'yes' and 'no' flashlights continue to go on and off when appropriate, only paying half attention to what Eri was asking as my mind traveled back in time.

I remembered being six years old, shortly after my father's death, and telling my mother about how Daddy had come to see me before bed, how he'd come to say goodbye and tell us to not be sad, that he loved us very much and everything was all right. I remembered how she'd tried to convince me it had all been a dream, and how adamantly, at first, I'd denied it being a dream. How _sure _I'd been that I'd been wide awake, that I'd really seen him sitting on the edge of my bed, that he'd really spoken to me. I hadn't understood at the time why telling my mother that Daddy said not to cry had made her cry even harder; I hadn't understood why she'd been so angry with me for 'fibbing'when I'd been telling the _truth_. I remembered then, in that moment, as I vaguely paid attention to Eri's various questions, that back when I was six I'd finally made the decision to just not talk about it anymore, knowing it made her sad, and then, eventually, as I got a little older, I'd actually started to question myself about what I remembered. _Had _it all been a dream? I'd eventually convinced myself that it had been.

Now, in that moment, as it looked more and more like Eri was actually speaking to Kikyou, I wasn't so sure anymore.

Sounding kind of like a crime scene investigator interviewing a witness - or suspect - Eri had been asking Kikyou questions like 'Did you know a man named Naraku?' and 'Had you and Inuyasha been having relationship issues?' That last one had received a strong _no _response. Inuyasha seemed to be a sensitive subject because every time his name was uttered there was a gust of wind associated with Kikyou's answer, as if that was her way of giving us a little attitude to accompany the turning on and off of the flashlight, which admittedly could seem like peaceful communication otherwise. How, exactly, does one go about making a flashlight _yell _a response, right?

Kikyou found a way.

"Is Kagome correct in thinking that you _do_ know that Inuyasha's innocent?" Eri asked, and I can understand why she'd asked that. She'd wanted to get that aspect of the folklore cleared up, as had I. Perhaps Kikyou _had _learned the truth about Naraku's deception at some point over the years and she was merely hanging around now because she was still pissed off about having been murdered either way.

It was a logical hypothesis, and one that I'd thought made perfect sense, but if that'd actually been the case then she would've just lit up the 'yes' light again, no harm no foul. Instead, all hell broke loose.

"What the...my phone just died." Ayumi said, earning three sets of eyes on her for a brief moment before the 'no' flashlight, my flashlight, lit up and stayed on, the beam becoming brighter and brighter until Ayumi and Yuka both had to shield their eyes while Yuka cried out "What the hell?!"

Then my flashlight actually started shaking, and with matching shaking hands I tried to record the event like a good little reporter. That time my shaking hands had had nothing to do with the cold, although I couldn't help but notice how _freezing _it suddenly felt. Then, the tiny lightbulb exploded with a loud pop, and all four of us screamed and jumped to our feet, backing away a few paces. I was _still _recording, but then the camera went dead. Not sure what else to do, I tucked it into my pocket for safe keeping.

Another strong gust of wind rose up in that moment and blew out all the candles again, leaving our only light sources Ayumi and Yuka's flashlights; standing on either side of Kikyou's grave, Eri and I stayed very close to our respective, flashlight wielding partners. In the beam of Yuka's flashlight I noticed that I could actually see my own breath, as well as hers. It'd been cold before but it hadn't been _that _cold. I was too full of adrenaline to care too much about the temperature, though. This shit was going _down _and suddenly, I'd felt guilty and responsible, my sympathies for her plight returning full force. Now fully convinced that we really _were_ dealing with her ghost, I'd felt that I had to apologize, on behalf of all of us, but mainly for my own previous foolishness.

"Kikyou, I know I was trying to get a rise out of you earlier and threw your death in your face, and I'm sorry. That was very cruel of me, and I didn't mean to upset you so much. The truth is, I hadn't even thought you were _real _when I said those things. I thought talking to you was just a game and so I was just saying whatever I wanted. That's no excuse, and I apologize. I don't know what else has been said or done to you over the last fifty years, if other people have been playing along with your dying belief of Inuyasha's betrayal just to bring out your hatred, but if so then that's even crueler because the truth is Inuyasha's _not_ the one who killed you, Naraku did."

There was another strong gust of wind in that moment, but nothing else seemed to happen afterwards so I kept going, holding my arms tightly folded across my chest as I shivered. It was all I could do to speak without chattering teeth.

"It's perfectly all right to be upset about how you died. Nobody blames you for being angry about your death. But Inuyasha _is_ innocent. He didn't-"

"_Noooooo!" _

"...Please tell me you guys heard that?"

Ayumi and Eri both made their way around to my and Yuka's side of the grave, giving Kikyou's plot a wide birth as they circled around to stand with us on what was Kikyou's left.

"That sounded like a woman's voice crying _no_." Yuka said, referring to the scream I'd just heard, and Ayumi and Eri both nodded their agreement. I sighed a little in relief to know that I hadn't been the only one to hear it, even though the fact that it'd been _real _was more than a little unsettling in its own right.

"I hope your voice recorder is still working." I said to Eri, who glanced briefly over towards the grave to where the recorder still sat between our two flashlights.

"I'm not checking it." she replied, mind-set to abandon ship. "I think we should just get out of here."

"No argument here." Yuka said right away, which earned a frantic nod of agreement from Ayumi.

"But, isn't that kind of like letting the genie out of the bottle and then running away?" I asked, biting my lower lip in thought. "Don't we have a responsibility to make this right?"

"You want to _stay?" _Yuka asked me incredulously.

_Do I? _I'd questioned myself, unable to fully explain the emotions I'd been feeling.

All I knew was that my earlier sympathy towards Kikyou was back, and while yeah, I'd been spooked for a minute there, I wasn't really _afraid _of her. There were no stories in the last fifty years of Kikyou's spirit actually _hurting _anybody, after all. I felt like she needed _help_, she needed _closure_, and maybe it was tough love, but she needed to hear what I had to say, she needed somebody to tell her the _truth_. For some reason, I felt like I was the only one who really cared, and that if I _didn't _try to help her, nobody else ever would.

"If you guys want to leave, fine. I can call a taxi to take me back to the dorms later."

_Assuming Kikyou hasn't sucked my phone's battery dry_... I added in my thoughts, not saying that part out loud. I didn't want my friends to feel guilty for 'abandoning' me if they wanted to hightail it out of there. I didn't really _want _to stay, either, but I felt like I _needed _to stay. Something inside of me would just not permit me to leave just yet. It was almost like I was _supposed _to be there.

"We came here together and we'll _leave _together." Eri stressed, and before I could open my mouth in protest, thinking she was about to try and insist that I leave with them, she added, "If you want to stay, we'll stay."

"We will?" Ayumi asked, sounding like a disappointed child, before shooting me a falsely brave smile and adding, "I mean, of course we will."

"We _did _all agree to come do this here tonight." Yuka stated concededly.

"And it _was _originally my idea." Eri also acknowledged, shooting me a supportive grin and nod.

Smiling at what genuine friends they were turning out to be, it dawned on me in that moment that I wasn't feeling quite as cold as I had been moments prior, and realizing that nothing else had seemed to happen after hearing that disembodied scream, I began thinking that maybe the paranormal activity had reached its peak. Usually on those kinds of shows they might get one big reaction or response to something, but it's climactic, with nothing else really happening afterwards. Mentally crossing my fingers that that was the case, I decided to approach Kikyou's grave to retrieve Eri's flashlight and, more importantly, the voice recorder.

"You guys stay here, I'll be right back." I said as I left the group.

"Famous last words." I heard Yuka mumble under her breath although I probably wasn't supposed to hear her.

I didn't comment, leaving them where they stood as I slowly approached Kikyou's grave. I felt like I was approaching the mouth of a cave and I wasn't sure if an angry bear was inside or not. But I _really _wanted that voice recorder and so it was that desire that drove me forward. Stepping around to the foot of Kikyou's grave, because I felt it was better to 'face' Kikyou head on, look her tombstone in the eye as it were, I glanced down over the plot stretched out before me and the five doused candles with Kikyou's picture in the middle, and quickly decided to leave that stuff alone, my goal only to retrieve the voice recorder and working flashlight. Yuka was shining her Mini Maglite in my direction in 'flood beam' mode to give me a little more light to see by, which I greatly appreciated, since it was pretty dark out otherwise since it wasn't a full moon. I was actually glad that it wasn't full moon, though. That would've added an extra touch of 'spooky' I didn't need.

Stepping forward, and onto the actual plot of Kikyou's grave, I reached down for the recorder first, picking it up, before then reaching for Eri's flashlight. It turned on before I touched it, my hand outstretched towards it, and I jumped a little in surprise, snatching my hand back as I stood up straight. Then I heard what sounded distinctly like a wicked female chuckle, like the kind of quiet laugh a female villain in a movie might make under her breath as she watched her plans fall into place, and for some reason, it pissed me off.

"Oh, so you think this is funny?" I said in an irked tone of voice, earning confusion from my friends as Ayumi chimed in with "I don't think this is funny at all."

I passed them a quick glance, unable to see much since Yuka's flashlight was still shining in my direction, but I quickly realized they apparently hadn't heard that laugh, not that it mattered. I had, and I knew it was real; I knew Kikyou was fucking with me.

I bent down and reached for the flashlight again, and it rolled to the side by a few inches, just out of reach from my current position. I stood back up empty handed again, feeling more exasperated than anything else.

_So we're reduced to playing 'keep away' now? _I thought, not afraid in the slightest even if I should have been; even if a normal person _would _have been.

I wasn't a non-believer who'd suddenly been forced to accept that ghosts were real and was unexplainably totally fine with it. Not really. I'd realized in that moment that I originally _had been_ a believer; I'd seen my _father's _ghost as a child, had _spoken _with him, and I'd forgotten. I'd made myself forget. Made myself _pretend _I didn't believe. Looking back on it, I'd even seen my grandmother's smiling face out of the corner of my eye at least once or twice shortly after her death, even though I'd immediately brushed it off at those times, telling myself it was just my mind playing tricks on me. Now that I'd been reminded that ghosts were very much real, I'd thought of Kikyou as a person no different from anyone else; an angry woman who felt jaded and scorned.

"Hell hath no fury..." I muttered under my breath.

My friends got braver in that moment, apparently wondering what was taking me so long, although they must have all seen how Eri's flashlight had turned on before I'd reached it. Huddled together as a group they inched their way closer to me until they were just a couple of feet behind me, facing Kikyou's grave head on as well.

"Is the recorder still working?" Eri asked, and I glanced down at the voice recorder I held to note that it did appear to still be recording, it hadn't turned off.

"Looks that way." I answered, since we had no way of knowing what was actually on it until we played it back. Could've been nothing but static.

Turning and handing the recorder to Eri, I then made a third grab for the flashlight, and I didn't flinch when the light went back off again before I touched it, picking it up quickly before it could roll away again. I heard my friends' collective intake of breath at the light going out, but I didn't look their way as I screwed the Mini's head back into the 'on' position, tightening it to the 'spotlight' setting just to make sure Kikyou couldn't turn it back off yet again. Ignoring how _cold _the flashlight actually felt, like it'd been in a freezer for hours, I shined the light on Kikyou's 8x10 photograph. Since I'd clearly been wrong about the paranormal activity having reached its peak I knew my mission wasn't over yet. Kikyou was still with us, which therefore meant I still had to talk to her.

As if telling me not to look at her, the glass of the framed photograph cracked as soon as my light beam hit it, and from a central point, directly over her face, spider-webbing outward. I flinched for a split second at the unexpected act, but didn't let it rattle me as I still said my piece.

"Kikyou, the truth hurts, and I can get why you don't want to let go of the hatred you've felt for the last five decades, but the fact remains that _Naraku _is your killer. Yours _and _Inuyasha's. He went to prison for your murders and is still there, for life; he's seventy years old and is going to die behind bars to pay for what he did to you. It might not seem like justice was served since he didn't die for what he did right when he did it, but if you _really _want revenge then go haunt his ass in his prison cell and make the rest of his days miserable. There's no reason to hang around the cemetery or college making _yourself _miserable, holding onto a grudge you shouldn't have had in the first place. Inuyasha _is_ innocent."

As soon as I finished speaking the air around me suddenly got so cold again that all the hairs on my arms stood back up, goose bumps covering my exposed arms. I could see my breath again, and my flashlight got colder and colder until it almost burned my hand and I had no choice but to drop it, hissing in discomfort as my fingers tingled.

My friends gasped, and Ayumi started to say "Kagome, are you-" and I assume she was going to ask me if I was okay, but in that moment the flashlight beam started flickering and she cut herself off mid-sentence, all four of us staring at the flashlight as the beam got duller and duller before it went out, this time as if from dead batteries. I leaned forward to pick it back up again, just to see if it might possibly still work, but before I reached it all five candles around the broken picture suddenly flared to life.

_That_ got my attention, as I gasped and jumped back in surprise. I didn't actually scream, but my friends did. I can't really say I blame them, either. At least nothing especially freaky happened, like a thin trail of fire suddenly going from candle to candle, drawing out the pentagram in the grass. That would've been a cool addition if this were a movie, but this was real life and I was just about at my limit for freaky for one night. Kikyou was seriously trying my patience.

"Where's the ghost of Inuyasha when you need him?" I mumbled quietly, sarcastically, until saying it out loud caused the proverbial lightbulb to light up over my head.

Where _was _the ghost of Inuyasha?

"Kikyou, isn't Inuyasha's spirit around anywhere?" I asked her then, truly perplexed. "Don't you know that he's dead, too? That he died the same night you did? That he died fighting Naraku for _your _sake? Can't you _talk _to him?"

Nothing else immediately happened, so turning and glancing over my shoulder at my friends for a moment, I shrugged, and then turning back I spoke to the sky.

"Inuyasha? Are you here?" I asked.

Nothing.

Turning around again, I addressed my friends.

"I don't understand why there aren't any stories about _his _ghost appearing or sticking around because of what'd happened. I mean, I seriously doubt he just 'passed on' all nice and peaceful like if the eyewitness reports are true." I said, and Eri shrugged.

"I don't know, Kagome. The stories are what they are." she answered.

She did have a point. Logically, the only reason there were no stories about Inuyasha's spirit to go along with the stories of Kikyou's spirit had to be because he _hadn't been_ making appearances like she had over the last fifty years, but why? I knew I didn't really understand how the whole ghost thing worked, but I'd seriously doubted his absence was because back in the day people had actually beckoned Kikyou through a séance which had then made her spirit stick around afterwards for some reason, while Inuyasha had never been summoned. I supposed it was a possible explanation, but it just hadn't felt right. Yuka had a different theory, which she chimed in with in that moment, and hers had immediately felt _right _to me.

"Maybe it's because Kikyou died thinking the love of her life killed her, so she's fueled by the power of her hatred, just like the legend says, while Inuyasha just died knowing he had failed to save her. He died feeling remorseful, instead of vengeful, so his ghost probably just isn't as strong as hers."

"That makes sense." I agreed right away, believing she was correct. "Maybe he even-" I started to add, but stopped mid-sentence when I thought I saw some movement behind my friends, like a shadow person walking between the headstones.

Noticing where I was looking they all turned around to look in that direction, too, Yuka and Ayumi both shining their flashlights that way, but there was nothing.

"What?" Yuka asked as she moved her beam around.

"Thought I saw something." I answered honestly, before quickly turning and scooping up both flashlights on the ground, Eri's and mine, before Kikyou could do anything else to them.

After confirming that Eri's wouldn't turn on I tried swapping batteries, since I'd figured the batteries in my broken Mini were probably still good. Turned out I was right, and the batteries had indeed still been good, for all of five seconds. I'd made a happy sound as Eri's flashlight came back on, but it just got super cold again, until it felt like I was holding dry ice, and dropping it when the sensation got painful the light then proceeded to flicker out, those batteries clearly drained as well.

"Damn it..." I grumbled under my breath.

Then, to make matters worse, both Ayumi and Yuka's lights also flickered out in that moment, earning frightened whimpers from my three friends as they huddled together even closer.

At least Kikyou hadn't attempted to freeze their hands off. She must have just drained their batteries for the energy boost. I got the distinct impression that I was her main target, although I also knew I'd put myself into that position, and that was fine with me. If I could keep her attention focused primarily on me so that she'd leave my friends alone, I knew I could handle whatever she threw at me.

I hadn't really meant that _literally_, but when another strong gust of wind that seemed to be focused exclusively on me came from the side and pelted me in the face with a little bit of sand, I stood my ground and took it, just turning my head to protect my eyes. I didn't get afraid. I didn't run away or beg Kikyou to stop it. And I most certainly didn't apologize for telling her the truth.

"Is that all you got?" I said once the wind died down. "Throwing a tantrum doesn't change the fact that you've held onto misguided anger for the last fifty years."

"Shut up!"

"Did you guys hear that, too?" I asked my friends as I glanced their way almost nonchalantly; they nervously nodded their heads in the affirmative.

"Kikyou, let's be reasonable about this and talk it out. Why are you so upset? If I'm way off the mark here and you're pissed off for some other reason, and you do indeed know that Inuyasha isn't your murderer and my having the wrong idea about your anger is just upsetting you even further, then please _say_ so. Please tell me _why _you're upset and then maybe I can _help _you."

"_There's no helping her_..._" _I heard mumbled quietly, so quietly I wasn't sure at first if I'd even really heard it.

Instead of the kind of disembodied way Kikyou's screams had seemed to echo and come from all around, with no distinguishable direction the sound had come from, this almost felt like whoever'd said it was standing right behind me, whispering in my ear. I'd definitely heard it in only my right ear, and not my left. Caught off guard, I'd quickly turned around, as if honestly expecting to see someone standing directly behind me, even though I _knew _it couldn't have been any of my friends because they were all still huddled together a few feet away, and besides...it'd been a man's voice.

"What is it?" Eri asked, apparently able to tell from my expression that something'd just happened.

"I thought a heard someone else's voice." I answered, asking, "Did you guys hear anything just now?"

"I haven't heard anything else after she screamed 'shut up'." Yuka answered.

I furrowed my brow, closed my eyes, and tried to listen.

"Inuyasha, was that you? Are you here with us?" I asked.

Nothing.

I kept going, assuming our theory was correct and his spirit just wasn't as strong as Kikyou's. Especially now, if she'd been drinking from our batteries and he hadn't gotten any. What I'd started to say before, when I'd thought I saw a shadow person in the background and had cut myself off, was that maybe he actually _had _been around too this whole time and just nobody'd ever noticed him. Anything he might've been able to do, like the occasional knocking sound, flickering light or moving object, had probably all gotten contributed to Kikyou.

How frustrating.

_Well, we all know life isn't fair, and I guess it looks like the afterlife isn't fair, either_... I thought sympathetically, before trying again to make contact.

"Inuyasha, if there's _anything _you can do to let me know you really are here, anything at all, then please do it, whatever it is. I _need _to know that you are here with me."

I'd realized right after I said it that I'd said 'me' instead of 'us' but didn't bother correcting myself. I _had _kind of felt like I was going it alone at that point, my three friends just observing, not that I blamed them. They were troopers for sticking around at all when they'd wanted to leave, as frightened as they'd been.

Instantly at my words, I felt my body temperature drop, but silently praying it was actually Inuyasha trying to communicate and not an attack by Kikyou, I tried not to resist and let the sensation of being enveloped by a subzero mist consume me. It was surreal. I was too cold to shiver. I felt on the verge of passing out. I must have looked it, too, even in the low light of the five candles and partial moon above, because I vaguely heard Eri cry out my name in concern, but her voice seemed muffled and far away. Then I felt it; a hand, gripping my own. A strong, male hand, clasping mine and squeezing gently. The kind of squeeze a friend might give you in encouragement if you were nervous about something you were about to do. Slowly, as if in a trance, I moved my head to look down at our joined hands and saw nothing but my own, empty hand, even as the sensation remained. Looking up, to where the man holding my hand would supposedly be, I was startled, but not afraid, to see a pair of soft brown eyes staring back at me. They'd almost looked...concerned, and with a hint of guilt, as if those eyes, too, were worried for my well-being. I blinked and it was gone, and then suddenly I was on the ground and my friends were hovering over me, trying to help me back on my feet while frantically asking me what'd happened and if I was all right.

I knew what had happened, but how to explain it to them? He'd had to tap into my own energy in order to show himself, but that was all right because I'd told him to do whatever it took, and to know that I'd been right, that Inuyasha _was _also still around, that was a triumphant moment for me. That he'd apparently felt guilty for having to do what he'd done I'd found touching, and all the more reason to harbor no ill will towards him because of it. Wobbly getting back on my feet, I assured them, "I'm...I'm fine..."

Feeling better by the moment, I straightened up and added proudly, "He showed himself."

Eri was looking at me in concern, not as if she didn't believe me, but probably because she _did;_ she was worried for my well-being after a close encounter like that. "It's all right." I assured her and then the others, as I made eye contact with all three of them one by one. "He wasn't trying to hurt me. He's not violent. His eyes looked so...apologetic."

There was another crazy gust of wind as I said that last part, which _should _have blown out the five candles again except instead it only made them glow even brighter, the wind fanning their flames. Then the broken frame in the middle started to shake, and I distinctly heard Inuyasha's voice say _"Kikyou, don't_._" _He'd sounded worried, almost like he was pleading with her.

I don't think my friends heard it, but all four of us definitely saw it as a few triangular shards of glass suddenly rose up out of the broken frame and made a bee-line straight for my face. I didn't have time to scream, or turn away and try to shield myself. I watched, in shock, as the glass levitated and then immediately bolted towards me, and then, all of a sudden there was a man standing in front of me, facing me. A Japanese man with long black hair, dressed in an old style black suit with a black cape and white ruffled shirt. His Halloween costume. But he wasn't wearing the mask, and his face... I couldn't describe the emotions his expression evoked in me. There was a desperation there, as if he'd tapped into a power reserve he hadn't even known he'd had, just in order to manifest himself and save me. And he _had _saved me. The glass shards, they'd fallen to the ground when they'd his back, as if he'd honestly been as solid as he appeared.

"Kagome...what?" Eri said slowly, in wonder, and I glanced her way for a brief moment and then instantly regretted it when Inuyasha disappeared. I looked back and he was gone.

"Did you guys _see _that?" Yuka asked then, amazement in her voice.

I opened my mouth to say something, but before I could, Ayumi chimed in with, "It was like, like a human-shaped mist, and it blocked the glass somehow."

"Do you think that was Inuyasha?" Yuka asked.

"Must have been." Eri replied.

"Human-shaped mist?" I asked, confused. Was I really the only one who'd seen him looking like a normal person?

"You didn't see that, Kagome?" Ayumi asked, surprised. My next comment made her eyes bug out even more.

Shaking my head, I replied with, "I saw a man, as if he'd really been standing here. I saw Inuyasha."

"Ooohh, was he hot?" Yuka asked with a chuckle.

Typical Yuka.

Although it was comforting to know she believed me. From their expressions, they all did, and sure, doubting me wouldn't really have made sense at that point since we _all _knew we were dealing with the real thing, but even so, it was a nice change to tell somebody I'd seen a ghost without getting ridiculed for it.

"Actually, yeah. Total looker." I admitted then, smirking. It _was _the truth, after all.

That had apparently not been a wise thing to say in Kikyou's presence, though, because the broken picture frame started shaking again, accompanied by a female scream, and not wanting to take any chances, since I doubted Inuyasha could pull a repeat of that stunk so soon, if at all, I cursed under my breath and immediately turned and bolted.

"Shit." I said, as I ran past my friends, grabbing for them as I passed. "Come on!" I added, as I ducked down behind the first headstone I saw, the others hot on my heels.

The four of us huddled together on that stranger's grave, using their headstone as a shield. I'd figured Kikyou was most likely just throwing the glass and couldn't control the shards like heat-seeking missiles, so it'd seemed a safe enough location in a pinch. I'd hoped, at least, although it'd thankfully turned out I was right as nothing flew past us and then turned midair to get us like sitting ducks. Instead, we heard the sound of glass hitting the back of the gravestone we were huddled behind, and the four of us tucked in even closer.

"I can see we caught you at a bad time. We'll just be on our way, then." Yuka said, although she didn't budge. None of us moved an inch until we were sure it was over.

Very carefully untangling ourselves a couple of minutes later, I gasped when my eyes glanced over the gravestone I was leaning against. It was Inuyasha's.

Whispering, I gestured to the headstone.

"Look." I said, earning my friends' attention as I pointed. The trio all stared, dumbstruck.

"So he protected you twice." Ayumi said in wonderment, as if Inuyasha's spirit had led me to his grave.

Maybe he had.

"Thank you..." I murmured low, resting the palm of my right hand flatly on the headstone, over his name.

Turning to Eri then, I said, "I'm still not giving up on getting through to her, but I think I agree that we should go ahead and call it quits for the night at least."

"No argument here." Eri said, reaching across her chest to pat her backpack's shoulder strap, gesturing to the voice recorder she'd tucked back within the bag. "We've got plenty of evidence to go through, anyway. This is far from over."

That statement reminded me of what I'd captured on video, and I reached into my jeans to hand her back her digital camera, which she took and put away as well. The four of us then slowly rose to our feet, glancing carefully in Kikyou's direction, and noting that the candles were all out again I think we collectively silently agreed that if Kikyou relit them again and caused a fire that it'd be _her _fault as we left our trash and made a mad dash for the car.

As we neared Yuka's car she got her keys out of her pocket and started pushing the unlock button on the key fob, but it didn't work, and she quickly got frustrated, cursing at the remote and pushing the button even harder as we neared.

"You-know-who must have drained that battery as well." I said as we got to the car and Yuka used the actual key to unlock her door, quickly putting the key in the ignition and turning it into auxiliary to prevent the alarm from going off while simultaneously pushing the unlock button on her door so that the rest of us could get in the car.

I was just glad her car wasn't the new kind that didn't even take a key, because _then _if the fob went dead you were probably screwed. I was also tremendously grateful the car's own battery hadn't been drained. It started right up, and we quickly got the hell out of there, and even though it wasn't even eleven o'clock yet I immediately decided to _hell _with the Halloween parties back at our dorm. My ass was going straight up to my room and locking the door until sunrise.

Not that I'd thought a locked door would actually help me in any way, or daybreak for that matter, but it was the principle of the thing.

Grabbing my hoodie off the floor of the back seat and sighing in relief as I wrapped it around myself, slipping my arms through the well insulated sleeves, I then pulled my cell phone from my back pocket and wasn't really surprised to discover it wouldn't turn on, either, that battery also completely dead. I was _really _glad my friends hadn't decided to abandon me. I'd told them so in that moment, too.

"Thank you guys _so much _for sticking with me when I hadn't wanted to leave yet. I'm sorry I put you through that craziness." I said.

"Sorry?!" Eri asked as she looked back at me from the front passenger seat. "Tonight was _awesome!" _

Yuka laughed, and said, "I can't wait to tell my sister. She's going to shit her pants."

Slowly, Ayumi cracked a smile.

"I bet nobody else has got a story like we've got." she said.

"It _is _an awesome story." I admitted, "But let's not forget that Kikyou's a real person, with real feelings. Really messed up, warped feelings, but feelings none the less. I don't want to turn her into a circus freak. If more students find out about our 'success' and try to contact her themselves for fun and games then I'll probably never be able to get through to her or help her find peace."

"What, you want to adopt her all of a sudden?" Yuka asked. "For only fifteen cents a day you too can help end a ghost's purgatory..."

I laughed.

"I don't even know what I want to do, or what I _can _do." I admitted. "I just feel like...I don't know. I can't explain it."

"Kagome Higurashi, the Ghost Whisperer." Eri said as she looked my way, giving me a teasing wink.

I just shrugged.

Yuka started singing. "When there's somethin' weird, in your neighborhood, who you gonna call? Ka-_go_-me!"

That had all four of us laughing, and the further away from the cemetery we got the more at ease I felt. The rest of the drive back to campus went by peacefully, and walking up to our dorm house after parking the car we all disregarded the loud sounds of partying coming from all around us, ignoring the random costumed people running to and fro, and saying our goodnights, Eri and I retreated to our room while Yuka and Ayumi went their separate ways.


	2. Came Back Haunted

Blanket Disclaimer:

Inuyasha, and the characters therein, are the property of Rumiko Takahashi. I am in no way affiliated with Takahashi, or VIZ Productions.

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Chapter two: Came Back Haunted

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I hardly got any sleep that night, and for once it hadn't had anything to do with the loud music being blasted, or the playful screams of drunk people being stupid. For once I hadn't wanted to join them, either, ignoring the sounds of good times around me as I stared up at the ceiling, contemplating. If Eri had also been wide awake I didn't know it, since neither of us said anything else once we'd settled into our respective beds for the night. We'd spoken for a few minutes after initially changing into our pajamas, but after saying goodnight that was it, neither of us speaking again until morning.

Before going to bed Eri had promised to try and keep our adventure under wraps, at least until I could figure out what I was feeling in my heart that I needed to do for or about Kikyou. She was the one who'd been the believer from day one, and so now that I was telling her I felt connected to Kikyou in some way, almost drawn to help her, and that maybe it had all been meant to be and that she'd taken me to the graveyard that night in order for me to meet my destiny, she hadn't hesitated to believe me and had immediately promised to stand by me, whatever happened.

I'd also told her about my previously suppressed childhood memory of seeing, and speaking with, my father's ghost, and she'd immediately believed that story as well, even going so far as to tell me that maybe I was more sensitive to the spiritual plane than other people, that maybe her earlier joke of calling me a 'ghost whisperer' hadn't been that far off, after all. Admittedly, it _would_ explain why my father had come to _me_ back then, instead of appearing to my mother herself. What guy wouldn't want to say farewell to his beloved wife in person if he could, right? So if he _hadn't _been able to appear for his wife, if she hadn't seen him or been aware of his presence, then maybe giving his six-year-old daughter a message for Mommy had become the only way, his only option.

It would also explain why, when Inuyasha had manifested himself, I'd seen him as a solid person while everyone else had only seen him as a humanoid mist. At first I'd thought that he'd actually gone out of his way to appear more 'real' to me than the others, but that hadn't really made any sense. Why _me?_ Was it only because I'd been the one talking to him, or had there been some other motivation? _But_, on the other hand, if he'd only appeared how he'd appeared and that had been that, making no distinction between how any one of us saw him over the others, then he could have just appeared like _'behold, here I am' _and it was Yuka, Eri and Ayumi's own lack of 'connection' to that world that had prevented them from seeing him as clearly as I had. Of course, my ability to see him clearly had still begged the question _'Why me?' _but Eri had made a very good point during our talk when she'd told me to just accept my gift and not question it, because in all actuality, I couldn't know the answer.

Running that conversation through my head over and over again as I'd lied awake that night, I wasn't really sure if I even wanted to be special, but the more I thought about it, the more I'd realized that it explained why I'd felt so passionate about trying to help Kikyou all of a sudden; why I'd believed that if I didn't try to help her, nobody else would. Maybe nobody else _could _help her. Or nobody else at our school, at least. Obviously there were other mediums in the world, and I _really _didn't want to refer to myself with that word - or go into that line of work, for that matter - but if I actually _had_ been born with a gift then I'd supposed it was my duty to use it, at least this once.

I'd just hoped that other random ghosts wouldn't start coming out of the woodwork looking for my aid, like on _Ghost Whisperer_. One 'saving' would be good enough for me. Actually, at the time I'd figured I'd get two savings out of the deal, since I'd assumed logically that Inuyasha's ghost was stuck here because of Kikyou's misery, and that once she'd found peace and moved on, he probably would as well. Knowing that I didn't really have to focus on Inuyasha himself, then, as far as trying to help him directly went, I'd hoped that instead, _he'd_ help me help _Kikyou_.

First things first, though. I had to get him to talk to me again. I had to make sure that it hadn't just been Halloween night that'd given the two of them the extra oomph needed to materialize. According to the folklore on campus Kikyou made appearances all year long, but there _were _no such stories about Inuyasha and so I had to make sure he was also still with us and was just what would be the ghost equivalent to a wallflower.

Climbing out of bed on the morning of November 1st, I'd had my first course of action figured out. Step one: make contact.

Unfortunately, I'd had classes to get to that morning, as had Eri.

Meeting up with Yuka and Ayumi on our way to class, Eri said she'd start reviewing the audio from the voice recorder that afternoon after her last class, and told them to try and avoid spreading rumors of what all we'd experienced in the meantime. Nobody had really known we were going to the graveyard the night before, and so nobody was excitedly asking us the next morning how it'd went. Yuka and Ayumi both easily agreed to keep it to themselves, although they'd also expressed their desire in wanting to listen to whatever EVPs Eri might find, and they also wanted to look at the video I'd recorded, as did I to be perfectly honest, and so we'd all agreed to keep working on our little 'investigation' in private, reviewing the evidence we'd collected in private as well while at the same time giving me the time I needed to try and keep working with Kikyou's spirit. I'd hoped that maybe she'd just been extra pissed off the night before, what with it having been the anniversary of her death and all, and that maybe if I gave her a couple of days to cool off we could then start over fresh, letting bygones be bygones. I'd had a few ideas of how I could go about trying to reestablish contact with her, but in that precise moment I'd needed to focus on my English lecture, and so putting thoughts of ghosts out of my head, at least temporarily, I'd headed to class.

It only took me maybe five minutes to realize somebody had followed me there.

The first time my pen rolled off my desk and onto the floor I'd honestly thought I had just bumped my desk on accident. Hey, it happens. I'd picked my pen back up mostly on autopilot and continued listening to the professor. Only a couple of minutes later, though, I happened to glance down at my desk in time to see my pen start rolling _again_, and that time I knew I hadn't bumped it. My desk wasn't slanted, either, but the pen had started rolling as if it were. Reaching my hand out, I'd caught the pen that time so that nobody else around me thought I was a total klutz for dropping it twice within as many minutes.

It only took me a few seconds to realize that maybe I _hadn't _just happened to look down right at the right moment, but that instead, maybe whoever had _moved _my pen had actually been waiting _until _I looked down, to make sure I'd notice. Notice that my pen had very obviously been moved by some outside force.

Nonchalantly writing the word 'again' at the top of my notes, I'd then sat the pen down very carefully, in the middle of my desk, my focus on the professor limited at that point to only making sure he didn't call my name without me noticing. That would've been embarrassing. So trying to pretend I was still giving his lecture even half of my attention, I delicately released the sides of my pen, as if I were setting up dominoes, and then I waited. Only a few short seconds later my pen started rolling again, and _that _time, it rolled almost all of the way to the right side of the desk, to the point where I was prepared to catch it again, but then it suddenly stopped on its own and then rolled _back_, coming to rest in the middle of my desk, where it'd started. Picking my pen back up in that moment, because I'd actually needed it, I quickly scribbling down a few words I thought might actually be relevant for an upcoming exam, and then I kept my pen in my hand after that, glancing around nervously to make sure nobody else had noticed what'd just happened. Nobody had. Or at least, nobody had been staring at me as if I were a witch, so if somebody else _had _noticed my pen rolling around then they at least hadn't realized what they'd actually witnessed.

Trying to pay genuine attention to the professor for the next few minutes, I knew I couldn't ignore what'd just happened for very long, and so after a few brief minutes I wrote out the quick formula 'Inuyasha left / Kikyou right' on the top of my notes, near where I'd written the word 'again'. I'd figured that whoever it was would understand my meaning, knowing that I was definitely dealing with one or the other. Or at least, I'd _hoped _I was.

I was _so _not ready to deal with the concept of other, random spirits seeking me out.

Actually, even the realization that either Inuyasha or Kikyou had followed me to school had been about at my limit of unanticipated creepiness at that time.

_Disney's Haunted Mansion __told__ me to beware of hitchhiking ghosts, but did I listen? Nooooo_... I sarcastically scolded myself, hoping with mentally crossed fingers that I was dealing with Inuyasha.

Turned out I was right, and almost immediately after my fingertips left the pen it started rolling steadily towards the left.

_Cool, now I don't have to worry about trying to contact him again_. _He beat me to it_... I thought, both pleased and relieved.

Made much more sense that he'd haunt me rather than Kikyou, really. Thinking about it, I'd figured she probably didn't want to have anything more to do with me.

_Well tough titties_...

Again scribbling a note for my invisible companion, I wrote simply 'Stay with me, we'll talk after class.'

Nothing paranormal seemed to happen after that, and at the time I could only hope it meant that he was going to let me get back to the lecture, and not that he'd used up all his energy and was gone now for however long it'd take him to remanifest after recharging. Trying again to put thoughts of ghosts out of my head for the time being, then, since I knew there was nothing I could do about it in that moment either way, I genuinely paid attention throughout the rest of class. Once class was over, since I fortunately had about a half hour or so to kill before my next one, no pun intended, I wandered over to a little used corner of the campus landscape near where my next class was going to be and settled down in the shade of a tall tree, my back against the trunk. It was the place I often went to, to wait for my next class to start. It was peaceful there, the large tree bringing me a sense of nature and comfort.

"Okay..." I started, speaking seemingly to no one. I kept my voice down so as to avoid catching anyone's attention. "If you can actually speak out loud, even if it's just a whisper, that'd probably be the easiest and fastest way for us to communicate, but if that's too draining for you then we can also try it this way."

Taking my cell phone out of my pocket, which I'd plugged in to charge the night before, I went into the notepad app.

"You can either use the keyboard..." I said, demonstrating, "...or you can even just use your fingertip to draw on the paper."

I demonstrated that as well, then held my phone out flat in my right hand, waiting for him to try it. I wasn't sure if a trick like moving the pen on my desk had actually been done with genuine touch, or just by releasing a blast of projected energy, but I'd definitely felt his hand clasp mine the night before, so if he could do _that _then surely he could operate the touch screen of a smart phone, right?

It'd made sense at the time, but apparently I'd been wrong because nothing happened.

"Okay..." I said after a minute, quickly coming up with Plan B. "I hate to offer this, 'cause you know how us girls are with our phones, but if you need to, then go ahead and use its battery. Drain it, if it'll help you speak to me like you spoke last night."

_That_ got a reaction. It was utterly fascinating, watching how quickly the percentage started going down on my battery life indicator. Almost like a countdown on a digital clock, the number kept steadily decreasing. In what seemed like no time at all my phone started giving me a low battery warning, and then it shut down.

Then I suddenly heard what sounded to me like _"Need help_..._" _ whispered in my ear.

"Do you mean that you need help, spiritually? That _you _need my help, like to pass on? Or that _Kikyou_ needs my help? Or, do you just mean that you need help communicating, like now?"

"_Yes_._"_

"Ooookay, that doesn't really help _me _but okay."

I supposed the correct answer was probably 'all of the above'. I'd still felt like I was making progress, though. At least I knew I wasn't crazy. At least I knew I really _was _speaking with Inuyasha's ghost. I'd just hoped that he wasn't going to stay so damn cryptic. Reminded me of ghosts in movies and TV shows that try to help the main hero figure stuff out, but always through rhyme and riddle. Why couldn't a ghost ever just say anything outright?! But reminding myself in that moment that Inuyasha might be having difficulty communicating with me, I tried not to take his vague responses personally. His 'intelligence', as a haunting, wasn't in question. I knew he was aware; I knew he was _trying _to communicate with me. I figured he was probably as frustrated as I was.

Closing my eyes, I sighed quietly, trying to figure out what to say or ask next. A hand gently touching my shoulder snapped me out of it, and I opened my eyes with a start, expecting to see, well, anyone among the living. Instead, my eyes damn near bugged out of my head to see Inuyasha kneeling before me, his right arm outstretched, hand resting on my left shoulder. I could still feel it as I looked into his eyes, and his body appeared solid, like a real person. If I hadn't _known _he was a ghost I would have totally thought he _was_ a real person.

"Better?"he asked, sounding normal as well, his voice coming from his form before me, and I was damn near blown away.

It took me a few seconds to realize how Goddamn _cold _I suddenly felt, like I'd been chilled from the inside out, like I was locked inside a meat freezer in the back of a restaurant, but I didn't give a shit. The point on my shoulder where he was touching me, it still felt like a hand, and it wasn't painful. I knew he was tapping my energy in order to fuel himself, maybe linking the two of us together a bit, tying his energy in with mine, but I didn't mind. I wasn't afraid. I trusted him; trusted that he knew what he was doing.

"Much better." I murmured quietly, remaining conscientious of the fact that, as far as I knew, to any passersby I would appear to be talking to myself.

"You're the first...who can see..." he said, and it sounded like speaking was very difficult for him. I would've thought he sounded out of breath, if I'd have thought he still needed to breathe. I supposed what he was doing was probably the mental energy equivalent to struggling to lift a very heavy weight, and you could only hold it up for so long.

"I don't know why I can see, but you're not the first I've seen." I told him then, and he nodded, before his image started to fade away right before my eyes, the sensation of his hand on my shoulder also disappearing.

"Wait!" I said, a bit louder than I'd meant to.

A couple of students walking by too close for comfort turned and glanced in my direction, so I quickly raised the dead phone still in my right hand up to my ear and pretended to be having a conversation with somebody on the other end. Sometimes I amaze myself with the level of my genius.

"Are you still there?" I asked then, any possible observers none the wiser.

I both felt and heard a small tap beside my ear, as if somebody had tapped the exposed part of the back of my phone with their fingertip.

"Okay, there we go." I said then, happily thinking that we just might be in business. "Is that easy enough for you to do?"

Another tap.

Lowering my voice a little bit because this next part would've sounded weird to an eavesdropper, although I was definitely keeping the phone at my ear for both appearances and functionality so I at least didn't look like I was talking to myself, I asked, "How about we switch to two taps for yes, and one for no, sound good?"

Two taps.

"Okay, perfect."

Grinning, and still keeping my voice low enough so that I could more or less speak freely, since there weren't too many people milling around, I quickly decided that figuring things out with Inuyasha was more important than one or two eavesdroppers possibly thinking I was nuts.

"Is your soul trapped in limbo, unable to move on?"

Surprisingly, I only received one tap.

"Wait, so you can 'move on' to the next life if you _wanted _to?" I asked, confused.

I received two taps, so I definitely knew he was doing the 'yes' and 'no' thing correctly. An idea came to me, then.

Curious, I asked, "Is _Kikyou's _soul trapped, unable to move on?"

Two taps.

Working off a hunch, then, I asked, "Are you yourself choosing to stay _because _Kikyou is trapped here?"

Two taps.

Things were starting to make sense now.

"Can you communicate with Kikyou?"

One tap.

"Is she what people call a 'residual haunting', meaning she's just an echo of energy, completely trapped in her own suffering, on a repeating loop, unaware of the outside world?"

I hadn't thought that was the case since the night before it'd certainly seemed like we'd been communicating with Kikyou just fine, but I just wanted to clear up any possible misconceptions I might've had.

One tap. So I'd been right.

"So she is what we call an 'intelligent haunting', like you, meaning she's aware of what's going on and is basically just herself but no longer in a physical body?"

Two taps.

"But yet, _you_ can't communicate with her, is that right?" That part still hadn't made sense yet.

I received another **yes**, so knowing I couldn't ask him _why _and that he could only answer 'yes' or 'no' I went off the first theory that came to mind, figuring I'd go from there. Process of elimination and all that.

"Is she aware of your presence?"

**Yes**

Okay, so that eliminated the possibility that, intelligent haunting or no, she was for some strange reason unaware of Inuyasha's presence. I'd supposed it really didn't make sense that she wouldn't be aware of him, since _he_ was aware of _her_. Thinking back on the night before, and how he'd told her not to throw that broken glass even though she had, and my own thoughts on Kikyou being a scorned woman, the most likely explanation presented itself in that moment.

"Is she simply not _letting _you explain yourself, refusing to listen whenever you try to talk to her?"

**Yes**

Damn. Fifty years of not letting the poor guy get a word in edgewise. Of course, I was sure that at _some _point he'd managed to actually tell her he wasn't her murderer, she probably just hadn't _believed _him, refusing to listen to reason, refusing to let go of her hatred. No wonder she'd gotten so pissed off when I'd come along and told her the same thing. I'd suspected that most other college students that had ever held a séance in her honor had probably only asked her for a sign of her presence, and they'd gotten their jollies on hearing her make knocking sounds, or watching her move objects around. Probably nobody else had ever bothered trying to tell her about Naraku being her murderer instead of Inuyasha, and if they _had _and she'd flipped out on them the same way she'd done us, then that had probably put an end to it right then and there, the spooked students never trying to contact her ever again.

I wasn't going to be so easily persuaded.

"Is Kikyou here with us now?"

**No**

"Do you know where she is?"

**Yes**

"Can you help me get in contact with her again, when I'm ready to talk to her?"

**Yes**

"Can I get in contact with _you_ whenever I need to? Are you always going to be around and able to communicate?"

I nearly dropped my phone in surprise when, seemingly coming from the phone's speaker, I heard Inuyasha's voice say _"I will stay with you_._"_

It was quiet, nearly a whisper, but clear enough that I knew what I'd heard, and I took it to mean that, maybe under normal circumstances, he wasn't necessarily always around, but because he knew I was trying to _help_ he'd stick with me for that reason, so that he'd always be there whenever I might need him, since he knew I was trying to help _Kikyou_. Hearing him tell me he'd stay with me, which basically meant he was going to be haunting me for the next however long it took to deal with Kikyou, didn't frighten me in the slightest, even if for a normal person it would have. Instead, I'd felt relieved, grateful even, that he was so willing to help. He had probably been feeling just as relieved, thinking that _finally _here was somebody who could and would help him get through to Kikyou after all this time. I could definitely understand his desire to stick by me throughout the process.

I don't know what'd possessed me to say what I said next, but he _was _a twenty-year-old college boy, or at least, he'd used to be.

"Just no peaking when I'm changing clothes or in the shower." I said, a grin sprouting on my lips, a teasing twinkle in my eyes that for some reason, I could sense that he could see. I _could _sense that he could see me, hence my playful scolding.

I heard a deep male chuckle, then, and the sound sent shivers down my spine. In what way, I wasn't quite sure, but realizing in that moment that I was pretty much at his mercy, and that in all likelihood my privacy _was _about to be invaded over the next few days, that knowledge didn't bother me as much as it probably should have, either. I just tried to tell myself that when you're dead that sort of thing just didn't matter anymore, and that he'd only laughed at me because he'd thought my shyness was silly, not because he was a pervert who'd been taking advantage of being invisible for the last fifty years and I'd just called him on it.

_Besides, he loves __Kikyou_..._he's not going to go and kinda be unfaithful to her by sexually peeping at other girls when we're right in the middle of trying to convince her of his innocence and love_... I told myself then, realizing my shyness _was _silly.

Quickly deciding to change the subject, I cleared my throat with a chuckle of my own, and said, "Well...I've got to get to my next class. We'll talk more later."

Nothing paranormal happened throughout my next class, although I had kind of felt the sensation of being watched, a feeling that remained with me when I left for lunch afterwards. Yuka found me at the nearby McDonald's and expressed her relief to see that I was safe and sound, telling me how she'd tried to call me during the break after my first class and how she'd gotten worried when my phone went straight to voicemail. Apologizing, I told her briefly and quietly what'd happened and why my phone was dead, promising I'd try my best to keep her and the others updated on my progress as I explored my newfound working relationship with Inuyasha and our mutual goal of calming Kikyou's spirit. I also told her I was glad she'd found me because I was thinking I'd probably head home for the weekend, so that Inuyasha and I would have a quiet place to work things out where Kikyou wouldn't become an issue before I was ready, and I asked her in that moment if she could give me a ride, Yuka the only one out of our foursome who owned her own car. We usually took turns driving so that Yuka wouldn't feel like our chauffeur, even though that was exactly what I'd needed in that instance. She had readily agreed, though, much to my relief and gratitude. I hated the bus.

After lunch we bade each other a temporary farewell, and then it was time for my psychology class. I paid extra attention when the lecture turned out to be about how to help somebody deal with a troubling past and painful memories. That _was _what I wanted to do with myself, career wise, helping others to deal with their drama as a licensed therapist, and so absorbing as much from the class as I could I'd told myself to think of it as if I were about to have my very first patient. In a way, Kikyou was just like a regular person, no different from anyone else. Though granted, on the other hand, she was also a vengeful Japanese spirit; a type of specter that was notorious for eternally holding grudges. I'd mentally sighed just thinking about it, knowing I was about to put myself through some serious hell, although my desire to help her was still just as strong as ever. I wasn't going to back down from the challenge I knew it was going to be. _Why _I was quickly becoming so obsessed with the notion of helping her at all costs I hadn't a clue, but like Eri'd said, I was born with a gift, and I wasn't going to question it.

_So this is what it feels like to have a calling_... I'd thought, feeling both proud and humbled, as I exited my psychology class and made a quick decision, heading left instead of right.

Having decided it wouldn't be detrimental to skip my last class of the day, and knowing that I needed to get to the library before they closed, that became my destination. Logging online on one of their desktop computers as soon as I got there, I immediately began looking up and printing out some of the articles I'd come across in my original online research two days prior. I'd looked the sites up on my laptop, before, and hadn't printed anything out at that time. Thanks to remembering what a lot of my successful search criteria had been I was able to bring most of the pages I'd wanted back up in fairly short order, plus I also found a few new bits of information that I knew would definitely come in handy, like the fact that professional paranormal researchers had done a stint at Kikyou's family home only a few short years ago. Realizing she had some immediate relatives that were still alive and well, since the article had stated that the house was still in the family, andalso knowing that it meant the rumors of her spirit also haunting her childhood home _were_ true (because otherwise, why call in the investigators?), I made a quick detour to the white pages and got the address. _That _would _really _come in handy, the wheels in my head already turning.

Besides Kikyou's old home address, I had a nice collection of 'evidence' to show her, once I was ready to try talking to her again. I had things like original newspaper articles about her death, and about Naraku's subsequent conviction. Eyewitness accounts of the bereaved and enraged Inuyasha ripping his mask off as he arrived on scene, assuring all present of his identity, before he'd tackled Naraku to the ground, trying, and nearly succeeding, to kill the impersonator with his own knife, before unfortunately also gaining a fatal wound in the process.

Looking over the eyewitness accounts of what'd happened back then, I'd found myself wondering in that moment why and how it was that Kikyou could be more or less 'aware' of the world around her but yet still be so thoroughly convinced of Inuyasha's guilt, unless of course her anger truly stemmed instead from his failure to either protect or avenge her, but the sensation I'd gotten the night before was definitely that she still thought he was her killer. I knew I didn't really understand how the afterlife worked, though, and that just because I could apparently see and speak with ghosts easier than the average person it certainly didn't make me an expert on the subject. Perhaps Kikyou's spirit had been in a kind of shock for the first few minutes of her death, unable to process what was happening around her, and then when she came to Inuyasha was already dead, his spirit trying to approach hers to explain, and outraged she'd gotten away from his ghost and had never let him communicate with her since. For all I knew, Kikyou could have been under the impression it'd been a murder/suicide, and that Inuyasha had killed her and then himself so that the two of them could be together forever.

That'd sure as hell piss _me _off, and I knew I definitely wouldn't want to have anything to do with my boyfriend any longer after pulling a stunt like that, either. Not that I actually _had _a boyfriend at the time, but that was beside the point. I needed to try and put myself in Kikyou's shoes, while she was still in them, and then with my guidance I'd help her walk towards the light, so to speak. Hopefully.

That was the plan, at least.

Wondering if I should check out any books on how to deal with the paranormal but then quickly deciding against it, figuring I'd let my TV watching experience and my instincts be my guide, I collected my papers and headed back to the dorms. Eri was already there and welcomed me as I came in. She hadn't been _that _worried about me, she'd said, since Yuka had filled her in on why my phone was dead. She greeted me happily from her place at her computer desk and invited me to take a listen to what EVPs she'd found so far, cataloging all the 'electronic voice phenomenons' we'd recorded the previous night. Turned out everything we'd heard with our own ears was also on the tape, which had been a huge relief, finding that out. It was evidence to support the fact that we were neither liars nor crazy. I _did _want to let Eri go ahead and go forward with telling others what'd happened to us; I just wanted the opportunity to help Kikyou, first, so that people could then marvel over what our experience had been and it wouldn't put Kikyou through any further turmoil, her spirit no longer in limbo.

The video evidence was the most compelling, for sure, once Eri showed me the footage. It was something that would definitely have to go on the Internet at some point, my shaky recording still clearly showing how the flashlight had started freaking out before the lightbulb popped, not to mention all the previous interaction we'd had with the Minis, all the 'yes' and 'no' questions we'd gotten answers to. I had to admit, our little séance, as unprofessional as it'd been, had been _very _successful.

As Eri went to grab her phone and call Yuka and Ayumi to come over to our room and take a look as well, I took a seat at the computer and replayed the last of the video footage from just before the camera went dead.

Suddenly feeling the sensation of somebody standing _right_ behind me, as if leaning in and peering over my shoulder to stare at what I was doing, and knowing that it wasn't Eri because she was still on the other end of the room and on the phone, I murmured quietly and conversationally, "Modern technology's pretty groovy, huh?"

"Huh?" Eri asked, interrupting herself mid-sentence with Yuka as she lowered her phone from her ear. "What'd you say?"

"Nothing." I replied, waving it off.

Eri quickly finished telling Yuka to grab Ayumi and head over to our room before rushing back over to my side.

"You were talking to Inuyasha, weren't you?" she asked excitedly. "Is he here now?"

"I...I think so...it's just a feeling I have." I replied honestly. "But even if he _is_ here, he's not a sideshow monkey for your amusement." I added, for some reason feeling defensive at the notion.

Instead of looking offended by my comment, Eri waved her hand as if unconcerned.

"I'm not going to ask him to perform any 'stupid ghost tricks', if that's what you're worried about." she assured me, giggling. "I just want to know if he's here. I think it's cool, the way you can interact with him. I'm jealous, but I do understand that he's still a person with feelings. I want to help you help him and Kikyou."

Looking a little guilty, a frown forming on her face, Eri glanced around our dorm room, as if looking for any kind of sign of where Inuyasha might've been standing, assuming he was standing at all and not just 'there' without form or substance.

"I'm sorry, Inuyasha, for having a hand in upsetting Kikyou last night." she apologized then, much to my surprise. "I hadn't really thought about there being a way to_ help_ you guys, before last night, but I certainly didn't want to _hurt_ either of you. I'd just wanted to know once and for all if the ghost stories were real, if she was _real_, since I did already believe in ghosts but had never personally experienced anything for myself. Seeing is believing, right? So I'd wanted confirmation, I'd wanted _proof _of ghosts, to know that I was right, but I hadn't really thought about the fact that you two are suffering, and I'm sorry."

I just blinked at her, totally baffled, and more than a little impressed. I was jarred out of my stupor by the sound of Inuyasha's voice murmuring quietly _"Apology accepted_._"_

I smiled a little, and at the same moment Eri's eyes widened and she darted her eyes around the room as if frantically trying to search for something.

"Did you hear that, Kagome?" she asked me. "I think I just heard a guy's voice, but I couldn't understand what it was saying."

"It was Inuyasha," I answered, "...and he said _apology accepted_."

The smile that blossomed on Eri's face was one in a million, and it truly touched my heart that she so readily believed me. I _was _telling the truth, of course, but most people probably wouldn't have believed it so easily, I knew.

Before either of us could say anything else in that moment there was a knock on the door, and upon Eri's welcoming answer the door opened to reveal Yuka and Ayumi, who were both bouncing with excitement over getting to see and listen to our video and audio recordings from the night before. Letting the three of them squee in their excitement, I moved to observe quietly from my bed as they huddled together over Eri's computer desk. Sitting cross-legged atop my covers, I went through the collection of papers I'd printed out at the library. I'd had a nice, long, mostly one-sided conversation with Inuyasha during the walk back to the dorms, my dead cell held to my ear of course to avoid looking like a lunatic, and from the few _yes _and _no _taps he'd given me when prompted I knew he was on board with the angle of my developing plan.

Plugging my cell in in that moment, I let it get enough of a charge to turn back on and function, and then, while my roommate and friends were still giggling and gasping over the stuff playing on Eri's computer, I made a phone call.

"Hello?"

"Hi Mom..."

~o~o~o~o~o~

"Mama, Souta, Grampa! I'm home!" I called out, walking through the front door, tucking my key back in my pocket.

"Welcome home, Dear." my mother replied, walking in from the kitchen. "It's always such a pleasure when you decide to come home for the weekend. I'm making your favorite for dinner."

Sending her a thankful smile followed by a mildly apologetic and sheepish grin, I said, "I'm sorry I sprung it on you so last minute like this."

"Oh nonsense..." she waved off. "This is your home. You are welcome here any time."

Grinning at that, I hugged and kissed her after kicking my shoes off in the entryway, and then made my way up to my bedroom with my overnight bag.

"Hey, Squirt." I said as I passed Souta in the upstairs hall, ruffling his hair.

"I'm not a squirt any longer." he said, proudly pointing out the fact that we were around the same height.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah..." I acknowledged as I entered my room. "Grow as tall as you like; it'll never change the fact that I'm the oldest."

With that said I shut the door before he could retort, snickering to myself as I sat by bag down on my bed and went over to my desk, taking a pencil out of the pencil cup and setting it on the desk.

"You're here, right?" I asked, not having 'felt' anything 'off' during the car ride.

I'd figured that the sensation of being watched, of not being alone, probably came and went with how intensely he charged himself up, and whether or not he was disturbing the electromagnetic field around me.

_Or maybe it's my own sensitivity to him that's ebbing and flowing, and I've got to learn to concentrate_... I thought as I smiled, pleased, when the pencil immediately started rolling. It was a hexagonal pencil, too.

"Okay, good, I'm glad. We've got a lot to figure out tonight." I said, as I made my way over to my dresser and grabbed some clean underwear, a pair of sweats and a t-shirt.

"I'm gonna hop in the shower first, though. Now remember, no peaking." I teased. Chuckling, I opened the door to head out, only to gasp in surprise at the sight of Souta standing right in my doorway.

"Sheesh, Twerp. You just waiting there to spook me or what?" I asked, laughing a bit despite myself.

He didn't acknowledge my teasing accusation, raising a single eyebrow in inquiry.

"Who were you talking to?"

My eyes widened a little.

"Nobody." I answered quickly. Too quickly.

Leaning forward a bit, he peered around inside my room, as if to confirm for himself that I hadn't smuggled a boyfriend in through the window or something.

"There's nobody else here." I said defiantly.

"Then who were you talking to?" he countered, just as defiantly.

I had to hand it to him. The twerp had balls.

Thinking quickly, I replied with "Eri." while reaching for the cell still in my pocket and holding it up as evidence.

His expression clearly indicated that he did not believe me.

"The only way she could possibly peep on you in the shower is if you had your cell on video chat while in there, like _that _makes sense. Are you going to tell me there's a guy using Eri's phone that you're going to let watch you shower, and you wanted to make sure Eri herself was not in the room at the time?"

His tone of voice made it beyond obvious that he didn't believe that possible explanation for even a second, and even if he had, I could _feel _how red my face had gotten at his 'hypothesis' and just _knew_ my expression had been a dead giveaway.

"Okay, fine, I never have been able to lie to you." I conceded then, and he grinned triumphantly. "But!" I continued rapidly, peering down the hall for a minute and then lowering my voice as I met his eyes seriously. "You can_not _tell Mom. She just wouldn't believe it, and I'd rather not rehash old, painful memories for her."

"Huh?"

"I'll explain that part, too. You were just a baby at the time. Let me go shower, 'cause I stink, and then I'll tell you everything after dinner, okay?"

Leaning in, he sniffed, then making a show of crinkling his nose and waving his hand in front of his face he said, "You're right, you need a shower."

"Har-dee-har-har."

"I'm gonna hold you to that promise, Siss. Whatever it is, it sounds _good_."

"Oh, it is." I replied, grinning, before then making my way past him to the upstairs bathroom.

Both my shower and dinner passed by uneventfully, aside from my growing sense of anxiety over confessing everything to my younger brother, but regardless, true to my word, I invited Souta into my room once it was time to more or less retire for the night. Grandpa's room was downstairs and he always slept like a rock, so he wasn't a concern, but with Mom's room just at the end of the hall I was worried about her possibly overhearing us if we got too loud, so first and foremost I made Souta swear that he'd keep his voice down no matter what.

Even though I was feeling nervous to tell him what all I'd experienced, I'd also felt giddy, in a way. I was excited to share the truth with him because I just knew he'd get a total kick out of it. I knew he was into the paranormal 'cause we'd always watched those ghost shows on the Syfy network together over the years. In fact the main reason I'd even started watching them in the first place was because watching _him _watch them had almost been more entertaining than the shows themselves.

I just hoped he wasn't going to demand Inuyasha perform any 'stupid ghost tricks'.

Figuring I should start at the beginning, I told him first about how, when I was six, I saw our father's ghost, only our mother hadn't believed me and had thought I was either straight out making it up or it'd been a dream. I told him about how I'd eventually convinced myself that it'd been a dream, too, and how later, when I saw Grandma's ghost, I'd completely ignored it and had convinced myself from the start that it'd only been my imagination, never realizing until now that what I'd actually seen back then was real. He listened, wide-eyed, fortunately believing me instead of thinking either that I _had _dreamt it as a child or that I was trying to trick him in that moment, which I greatly appreciated. I then told him about the legend of Kikyou and Inuyasha from my college, which I found out he was actually already vaguely aware of thanks to the older siblings of some of his friends, although he told me in that moment that he'd never paid much attention to those rumors, believing in ghosts but having brushed off _those _stories as a stupid college prank. I told him how I hadn't believed the paranormal stories, either, until the night before, on Halloween night, and how, the day before last, I'd done online research to at least verify that the people involved had really existed. The story of the murders _was_ true.

He looked a little shaken up to hear that part, probably correctly assuming where I was going with my elaborate tale, since I'd told him how the previous night, Halloween night, had been my turning point. I launched into it, then, telling him how Eri had convinced me and the others to go along with her to the cemetery, how we'd played paranormal investigators and conducted an EVP session, the whole nine yards. I told him how Kikyou had made contact, and how she'd freaked out, freaking _us _out in the process, and then how Inuyasha had also made contact, how he'd shown himself and had even _saved _me from possibly getting some really nasty cuts or even losing an eye. I also told him about how Inuyasha and I were actually still in contact with each other, and how he was going to help me try to help Kikyou. That was who he'd heard me talking to earlier in my room. I told him I could prove I wasn't making it up, too, since I'd brought a copy of our video from the cemetery with me, showing our flashlight communication with Kikyou up until the camera went dead.

"I'm _definitely _gonna take you up on that offer, Sis, but I wanna know more about Inuyasha _now_." he said quietly but excitedly, asking for clarification, "You can just talk with him, like he's a normal person? You two are working together to help Kikyou find peace?"

"Yes, we can talk like normal, for the most part, and we're definitely going to try and help Kikyou." I told him, explaining, "I haven't tried talking to Kikyou again yet, but my plan is to try and get in contact with her again tomorrow. I don't know how successful I'll be, but I have to at least _try_."

I added that that was why I'd decided to come home for the weekend, so that Inuyasha and I could get a little privacy to figure things out without the risk of Kikyou eavesdropping on what we were planning and only hearing half the story, and then thinking we were plotting against her or trying to trick her or something. Who knew what was going through that mind of hers? There were also some other things I wanted to clear up with Inuyasha himself, discussing in greater length the passed down rumors of their tragedy to figure out what, exactly, was true and what wasn't, and so I'd wanted privacy for that as well. No Kikyou, and no Eri. Even though I knew Eri wouldn't have interfered, directly, I wouldn't have felt comfortable with her staring at me in amazement or whatever while I tried communicating with him. Inuyasha wasn't a sideshow monkey, and neither was I, even though I knew I couldn't really blame her for being amazed. It _was _an amazing situation, I had to admit.

"You got that right." Souta agreed, asking, "So is Inuyasha here now? Can he do anything to show himself?"

"Souta..." I scolded. "What did I just-"

"I know, I know..." he interrupted, "...and it's not like we share the same room like you and Eri do at your school, so you'll have _plenty _of privacy tonight. I just wanna see or hear _something _and then I'll leave you two alone, promise."

"That's why I offered to show you the video. That'll prove-"

"But it's not the same thing and you know it." he interrupted again, his voice whiny, pleading.

I _could _understand his desire to experience something first-hand instead of just watching a video, but I did _not _feel comfortable asking Inuyasha to 'perform' for my brother's satisfaction.

Closing my eyes and sighing, I pinched the bridge of my nose.

"If he wants to do something for you, that's up to him, but I'm not going to ask him to do-" I started, stopping mid-sentence when we both heard a faint thumping sound coming from Souta's bedroom next door.

Wordlessly meeting each other's eyes, we quickly got up and went into his room.

His Ouija board was on the floor, sitting upright, lid still in place, as if someone had merely sat the box there. Glancing up at the bookshelf unit it had been on, there was a perfect empty slot in the middle of his various, vertically stacked boardgames.

"Oh no way!" he said, eyes lit up in glee, as he rushed forward, grabbed the box, jumped up onto the bed and immediately began setting it up. "Come on, Sis, what are you waiting for?" he asked, beckoning me over with a frantic wave of his hand.

"Keep your voice down." I reminded quietly. We were even closer to our mother's bedroom in his room than we were in mine.

Still, I did have to admit that that'd been a fairly obvious sign. I was surprised by Inuyasha's generosity, but was definitely going to go with the program. The Ouija board had never even crossed my mind, but as I thought about it I was sure that others at my college _must _have used them in the past to contact Kikyou, and so clearly he'd seen them before and knew how they worked. I wondered how many times in the past Inuyasha had tried, and failed, to use them to communicate, the people involved for whatever reason never quite getting the message that it was him and not his girlfriend.

It was a question I hadn't planned on asking, though. I'd figured there was no point in dredging up his previous, failed attempts at communication. He had somebody to communicate with _now_, and so maybe instead of asking all the questions I should let Inuyasha just say what he wanted to say, I'd thought in that moment.

Right in _that _moment, however, I was going to go ahead and let Souta ask the questions. This was his playtime with the ghost; Inuyasha had offered, and I was more curious than anything else.

Joining my brother on his bed, we both placed our hands on the planchette; Souta didn't waste any time getting down to business.

"Inuyasha, was that you who suggested we use my Ouija board?"

Slowly, the pointer moved over toward the 'yes' on the board, and it had been the oddest sensation, feeling a cold set of hands gently cupping my own as the planchette moved. I swear it had felt as if the hands touching mine had been the ones guiding the movement; I was trying especially hard to not move the pointer _at all _just to be absolutely certain I wasn't doing anything subconsciously. There was no denying the feeling of his hands, though. Hands which became warmer to the touch as the light in Souta's room flickered for a moment, dimming before coming back to full brightness.

"Whoa..." Souta murmured, completely awestruck, and I had to admit that really, so was I. _One day_ was a little soon to find the whole 'communicating with the dead' thing blasé and unimpressive, after all.

"Is everything my sister said about what happened last night true?" Souta asked next.

_As if I would've been honest about the ghost but then lied about other details, sheesh_... I thought, although I didn't say anything out loud as the planchette moved away from the 'yes' and then back towards it again.

"What's it like being dead?" Souta asked then, and I bit back a groan.

_Oh, it's a stroll through daisies, I'm sure_... I thought, mentally snorting. _Daisies you're pushing up as you go along_...

I rolled my eyes at the thought, hiding it by closing them halfway through although I doubt Souta would've noticed anyway, his eyes fixated on the pointer as it began moving again. Curiosity getting the better of me once I felt it stop momentarily on the first letter, I glanced down and made mental note of the letter L, figuring it was way too soon to make any guesses as to what Inuyasha was spelling out. I'd always sucked at Wheel of Fortune, anyway.

When I realized he'd spelled the word _Lonely _I'd felt a pang in my heart I hadn't been expecting.

"Well you're not alone anymore." Souta replied matter-of-factly, and I really respected my brother in that moment. "Kagome's your friend, and even though she can see you and I probably can't, we can at least communicate this way, so I'm your friend, too."

The feel of his hands came back and the pointer started moving again, going back up to the 'yes' spot, and I felt my eyes tearing up. With his hands leaving mine once again, I then experienced what felt to me like a finger wiping away the single tear that'd slid down my cheek, and he must have actually done it because Souta's eyes became impossibly wide as he stared at my face. I felt cold, then. So very cold. I felt a set of hands on my face, gently turning my head to look to the side, and then I saw a pair of concerned chocolate brown eyes that were not my brother's gazing deeply into my own.

"_Please don't cry_..._"_ I heard him whisper.

I could hear Souta talking to me, then, but I couldn't quite make out what he was saying, lost in Inuyasha's eyes as I was. Then I didn't think I felt as cold anymore, and I was vaguely aware of the light in Souta's ceiling fan flickering again, going dim and back again a few more times. Then suddenly Souta was in my face, saying my name louder than I would've preferred, asking me frantically if I was okay while shaking my shoulders. As if snapping out of a trance, I shook my disorientation free and offered my younger brother a genuine smile as I calmly reached up and removed his hands from my shoulders, giving them both a gentle squeeze before releasing. He sat back, asking me again if I was okay.

"I'm fine, Souta." I assured him. "Inuyasha would never hurt me. He was just-"

The door to Souta's room swung open and we both turned our heads in surprise to see our mother rushing worriedly into the room.

"Kagome? Souta? What...?"

It must have been Souta calling my name that'd earned her attention, but seeing that I was clearly all right, and also seeing the Ouija board between us – something our mother had not really wanted Souta to have in the first place – her worried expression immediately melted into a disapproving frown.

"What's going on?"

"Nothing, Mom, we're just playing around. He doesn't have school tomorrow, so I figured what's the harm in hanging out for a while? We haven't seen each other in weeks." I answered right away before Souta could say anything, trying to sound as perfectly normal and nonchalant as possible. Honestly, what _was _the harm in goofing off with my younger brother if we missed each other and wanted to stay up visiting for a while, right?

If it'd been any other board game in the world, I'm sure our mother would have agreed with me. But considering _what _we were playing, and Souta's frantic cries, she wasn't so easily swayed.

"That kind of rubbish is not just harmless playing, Kagome." she scolded, almost accusingly. "Just what were you doing to scare Souta like that?"

_Ah_..._so she thinks I was pretending to be possessed or some other such nonsense to get a rise out of Souta_... I realized.

I knew trying to talk myself out of that one wasn't going to be easy. He _had _sounded genuinely afraid, after all, because he had _been _genuinely afraid. Best to take the blame, I'd decided then.

"It was just a stupid prank, Mom. I'm sorry." I offered, giving her my best 'unthinking youth' apologetic smile.

She slouched some and sighed quietly, a reticent half-smile creeping up her lips. She seemed disappointed in me, which hurt, but I knew it was for the best. Whatever she might've said next, though, I wouldn't find out because Souta spoke up in that moment, much to my chagrin.

"Kagome didn't fake nothin'! She really _can _see ghosts, and you've known it since she was six!"

"Damn it Souta..." I grumbled under my breath, while our mom stood back with a hurt and surprised look on her face, as if she felt slapped by Souta's words.

"Just what nonsense have you been filling your brother's head with, Kagome?" she asked me next, but Souta wasn't done defending me yet.

He wasn't a little boy any longer, and the rebellious fourteen-year-old was going to stand up for what he knew was right.

"I don't understand why you're upset, Mom. What's the harm in believing that maybe Dad's ghost really _did _come say goodbye? Wouldn't that be a wonderful thing to believe in? Why accuse Kagome of making it up?"

She sighed, looking exasperated, but it didn't turn into a screaming match, yet.

"Because there's no such thing as ghosts, plain and simple, and it doesn't do any good to entertain such fantasies. You only hurt yourself more in the long run, believing in something that doesn't exist. You need to accept the truth and move on."

"But the truth is ghosts _do _exist, and we're talking to one _right now_."

"Souta, enough." Mom said, in the tone of voice we'd both learned growing up meant _not _to push the issue any further.

In this matter, though, I could tell Souta wasn't going to back down, and I wasn't going to let him take a bullet for me, either. Reaching across the board, Souta and I met each other's eyes as I took his hand in mind, and then I turned and met our mother's eyes again.

"Last night the girls and I held a séance at the cemetery, and we made contact with the ghosts of Kikyou and Inuyasha." I knew she knew who they were, since she'd gone to the same college. "We communicated with Kikyou using the flashlight technique, and I have a video on my USB stick to prove it. I'm also still in contact with Inuyasha; he's staying with me while we work together to figure out how to help Kikyou's soul find peace, and he's in this room with us, right now."

"Kagome, stop." Mom said, looking _really _pissed, and if I'd still been a child I would've cowered at the look in her eyes.

I'm a grown woman, damn it.

"I have a gift." I said then, chin held high, as I paraphrased the kind of thing Jennifer Love Hewitt's character on Ghost Whisperer would've said. "I can see and communicate with spirits more easily than the average person. I think anyone has the ability to see a ghost if the ghost puts enough effort into it, but I can see them with them putting forth less effort than what somebody else requires. I saw Inuyasha as a solid man last night when my friends only saw him as a mist, when he appeared in order to block the broken glass Kikyou threw at my face. I saw him again this morning at school, and I can both feel his touch and hear his voice as clearly as if he were a real person, too. I-"

"Enough!" our mother exploded, then.

I think for her it'd become more about the principle of the thing, rather than her being _that _against the notion of ghosts in and of itself. It wasn't about that. It was about Souta and I defying her, continuing to argue when she'd told us both to shut up in not so many words.

"You just don't know when you quit, do you?" she continued, approaching my side of the bed.

She opened her mouth to say something else, but the ceiling fan light flickered again in that moment, and it gave her pause as she glanced up at the light for a brief moment with a furrowed brow. It wasn't enough to curb her ire, though.

"Why must you push my buttons?" she asked demandingly. "And now you've gone and filled Souta's head with your stories, your lies."

I could be just as stubborn as her, when the moment called for it.

"You have so much pent-up anger." I said then, in my best 'therapist' voice. "Does this negative association with ghosts stem from your own childhood?" I asked, genuinely wondering if I was right. "Did you see a ghost as a child, too, and _you _were so deeply scolded for it that now it's stuck with you, and you're repeating the cycle, punishing me as you were punished?"

Eyes flashing, she raised her hand to slap me across the face. She'd only hit me maybe twice before in my entire life, but even so I'd known going in that it was possible I'd push her that far again. Regardless, it'd needed to be said.

Eyes slamming shut as I winced in anticipation, the only thing I'd had time to do, I braced for impact the best I could in that split second, but the blow never came.

Instead, there was a loud crash, followed immediately by the sound of both her and Souta's startled intakes of air, and my eyes popped back open again only to widen even further as I realized another one of Souta's boardgames had slid off the shelf, this one handled less carefully, as the scattered playing pieces made a mess all over the floor. Peering down at the spilled game on the floor, I then glanced back up at our mother, expecting to see her eyes still staring in shock at the game as well, but instead, she was looking at the Ouija board, and I quickly sat back upright to look down at the board on the bed beside me. The planchette was spinning. Neither Souta nor I had touched, but it was spinning in a perfect circle, in the center of the board, as if it were a bottle we were playing 'spin the bottle' with.

I didn't think to count, but it had to have spun for at least a good five-six seconds, making a loud scraping sound as it moved so fast it appeared blurry, and then suddenly, instantly, it stopped, pointing at _me_.

The light flickered again, going all the way off and plunging us into darkness for a brief second before coming back on.

Then static started coming from the speakers on Souta's iHome, and we all watched, all slack jawed and silent, as the iPod's screen lit up, the song list scrolling until coming to a stop on 'Came Back Haunted' by Nine Inch Nails.

I looked our mom's way as the song began playing, and I think the simple fact that Souta's iPod had started playing _any _song all by itself was enough to make her actually need real therapy, based on the expression on her face. Once the lyrics dawned on her, which I could tell by the widening of her eyes, I had to suppress my desire to laugh outright.

Inuyasha had a wickedly awesome sense of humor.

And was also apparently up on 21st century technology.

I didn't want our poor mother to have a total nervous breakdown, and so after about two minutes, once the first chorus had concluded and I knew we'd made our point, I said "Okay, that's enough." in a conceding tone, as I got up and turned it off.

Turning to face her, then, my back to Souta's dresser, I offered her an apologetic smile, deciding to wave the white flag first.

"I didn't mean to upset you, Mom," I began, explaining, "I just have to stand up for what I believe in, and I believe in what I've seen and heard with my own eyes and ears."

She still looked marginally shell-shocked, but blinking in that moment, she shook her head a little bit, and then focused her eyes on me better, our gazes meeting.

"It...it really _is _true..." she said in wonder.

I was _so _relieved she hadn't remained in denial, accusing either Souta or I of rigging everything somehow. Even for our logical, rational mother, seeing _was _believing.

Glancing down at the Ouija board as if it were a direct representation of Inuyasha, figuring in that moment that it _was _the best thing I had to work with, I said to the board, "Inuyasha, meet my mother." Then glancing back up at my mother, I said, "Mom, meet Inuyasha."

"He-hello..." she said shakily, glancing down at the board as well.

Without Souta's assistance, the planchette started moving again all by itself, turning until it pointed at the word 'hello' written on the board.

Souta merely smiled triumphantly, clearly pleased with all that'd transpired in the last few minutes.

Our mother noticeably swallowed, and then turning my way, she pulled me into an unexpected embrace.

"I owe you an apology, Honey." she murmured quietly, and I hugged her back, my eyes tearing up again.

The three of us stayed up in Souta's room talking for around two hours before finally going to bed, with no more noticeable signs from Inuyasha although I was sure he hadn't actually left. He'd probably just been able to tell that it was a family moment he shouldn't interrupt. I knew he and I were supposed to have been the ones staying up to discuss his and Kikyou's background and the details surrounding their deaths, but this conversation with my mother and brother had simply been more important to me. My mom was opening up, wanting to let me share, willing to _listen _to what I had to say about it all, and I _couldn't _spoil the moment by telling her I didn't have the time to talk about it that night. So we talked. We talked in more depth about what all I'd seen back when I was a little kid, as well as what I'd seen the night before and that very morning, and even what Eri and I had discussed about my apparent gift.

Our mother had agreed, now that she'd been faced with the evidence, that it must be true, I _did _have a gift, and she apologized again for having doubted me as a child. She didn't tell us why she'd previously been so adamantly against the idea of ghosts, but whatever might or might not have happened during her own childhood, those were _her _ghosts, and she needed to deal with them on her own terms. Rule number one of being a therapist was that you couldn't make somebody talk about what they _didn't _want to talk about. You had to allow them to share what they felt comfortable sharing, trying to encourage them to feel more comfortable about it but without being too forceful. She'd tell me when she was ready.

Of course, I knew that that rule also applied to Kikyou, and that I'd have to find a way to encourage her to speak with me because I couldn't force her to talk about what she didn't want to talk about, either, but one break through at a time. In the meantime, as we finally said our goodnights and went our separate ways, Mom returning to her own room while I did the same, I'd been super stoked that that wall between us had finally been torn down, and that I wouldn't have to start pretending in her presence that I _didn't_ have the newfound gift I'd known I did indeed have.

And I owed it all to Inuyasha.

"I thought I was supposed to be helping you, not the other way around." I said quietly as I got under my blankets. "Thank you. I owe you big time."

After I stopped fiddling, getting settled, I felt the unmistakable sensation of a gentle pat on my right shoulder, as if from somebody standing over me at my bedside.

"_Thank __you_._"_ I heard whispered in my right ear, and I couldn't stop the stupid smile that spread across my face.

The smile remained on my lips as I leaned over and clicked off my bedside lamp, and with nothing else paranormal happening I drifted off into a peaceful sleep.


	3. Feel it come to life

Blanket Disclaimer:

Inuyasha, and the characters therein, are the property of Rumiko Takahashi. I am in no way affiliated with Takahashi, or VIZ Productions.

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Chapter three: Feel it come to life when I see your ghost

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The next morning there was a kind of unspoken agreement between Mama, Souta and I to not discuss what'd happened the night before in Grandpa's presence, since as I'd suspected he'd slept right through all the shouting and had been none the wiser. Breakfast concluded uneventfully. Then, after the three of us discreetly went up to my room where I'd proceeded to show both my mother and brother the video from Halloween night like I'd promised I would, I gathered up all my stuff, courage included, and made my way out into the world, borrowing Mom's car with her permission.

My destination? Kikyou's house.

_That _encounter did not go as smoothly as planned.

When a woman looking to be roughly around my mother's age answered the door I assumed correctly that she was Kikyou's niece, Tsubaki, the current owner of the long-time family home. I politely introduced myself, and figuring it wouldn't be wise to just come on out and say I'd had a confrontation with her deceased aunt two nights prior and wanted to see if she was currently around so that Inuyasha and I could try talking to her again in the calming environment of her childhood home instead of the crazy hecticness and bad memories of the college campus, I said instead that I was a novice paranormal researcher and that I'd been drawn into the story of Kikyou because of the decades-old legends on campus, and that because I'd found an article that talked about how they'd _already _opened their home to a paranormal investigation team a few years ago I was hoping that I'd be permitted to try my own hand at it for a research paper I was currently doing.

Tsubaki had, politely, told me to fuck off, in not so many words.

She said that her mother Kaede, Kikyou's younger sister, had still been living there at the time, and that since it'd technically been Kaede's house, _she'd _been the one who'd allowed the paranormal team to come in and 'disrupt their lives' as Tsubaki had put it. She said the whole thing had been a giant waste of time, and money, because it had not been for a 'reality show' and therefore had _not _been free. Apparently, it'd been somebody Kaede had actually called in herself, rather than anybody asking her for permission to do it, like I was.

I'd immediately thought that that might've been my in, and so I'd stressed how I had _no _intention of charging any kind of a fee whatsoever, and that she'd be doing me a huge favor by allowing me to indulge myself and that maybe, just maybe, it would be beneficial for the both of us, but she just hadn't been having it. Unlike how my mother up until the night before hadn't believed in ghosts, Tsubaki had been living with the proof of it her whole life, and she actually told me in that moment that she knew damn well the ghost of her aunt _was _still around, but that she was also _equally_ sure that Kikyou did _not _want to be poked and prodded like a guinea pig. She'd told me to leave both her _and _her aunt **alone**.

Realizing I'd actually sabotaged myself by trying to pretend I was a wannabe 'ghost hunter', since I actually agreed that Kikyou should _not _be treated like a science experiment, hence why I'd wanted to help her release her anger and move on, I tried to switch gears and tell Tsubaki the truth. Pleading for her to listen as she tried to close the door in my face, I told her in a rushed explanation that I'd actually already made contact with Kikyou once, and that I sympathized with her, was presently in contact with Inuyasha, and that the two of us wanted to _help _her because he'd been just as miserable as her for the last fifty years, watching her suffer in her pain without being able to console her because she thought he was the cause and wouldn't listen to anything he had to say.

Tsubaki paused for a moment, looking me over, and I'd assumed it was because I'd mentioned Inuyasha's name, since like I'd originally pondered on Halloween night there _were _no legends on campus about _his _ghost, and so therefore stating that I'd spoken with _him_ had to have given me more credibility in her eyes, right? But then after looking me up and down for a minute, she merely frowned, and told me that she didn't know what I was playing at, but that whatever it was, I'd better go find myself somebody else's haunted house for my fun and games.

Feeling both angry and desperate, I bravely, and stupidly, cried out for Kikyou directly.

"Kikyou, are you here?! It's me, Kagome! I've come to talk to you!"

Even with knowing her spirit was real as factually as I knew the sky was blue and grass was green, I hadn't been prepared for Kikyou's apparition, complete with a horrible blood stain marring her beautiful dress, to suddenly appear in the entryway behind Tsubaki. She glared at me with genuine hatred, and my shocked expression must have taken Tsubaki aback because instead of just continuing to slam the door in my face she paused again, and actually glanced behind herself, where I was staring. Apparently, she didn't see what I was seeing.

"What's your angle?" she asked me suspiciously then, eyes narrowed, and completely ignoring her I met Kikyou's eyes and held out my hand.

"Kikyou, let's just talk, like two girls. I brought some newspaper articles I want to read to you."

Before Tsubaki could respond to my obscurity, Kikyou's eyes did a freaky Hollywood thing and turned solid black, as her hair became frizzy, as if electrically charged.

"_Lies!"_ she shouted, which caused me to flinch in surprise while Tsubaki remained unresponsive, either not having heard her aunt's voice or having gotten completely used to it by that point.

Then Kikyou raised her fist and angrily punched the framed mirror hanging on the wall beside her, and _that _got Tsubaki's attention as she whirled around to stare agape at the broken glass.

Kikyou's ghost had also completely vanished the very instant her fist made contact, and I had the sinking suspicion that she wouldn't be showing herself again any time soon, nor would I be allowed to stay and wait for her.

"I think you have your answer." Tsubaki said then, sounding shaken up while also clearly trying _not _to sound shaken up.

Slumping my shoulders in defeat, because I knew she was right, I turned and left then, saying "Come on, Inuyasha, let's go." more for show than anything else, since I knew he'd obviously follow me.

During the drive back home the radio in Mom's car, which had been off, turned on by itself and started changing stations away from Mom's favorite station, going up just a couple of points until all that came through the speakers was static. I didn't bother fixing it. Then I heard Inuyasha's voice come through.

"_Don't give up_._" _he said, and I had to smile at his encouraging tone.

"Easy for you to say." I replied as a bit of an inside joke, since during the ride there he and I had already established how it _was _in fact easier for him to speak through the radio's static than on his own.

"_Kikyou always had a temper_._" _

That had been an interesting and unexpected thing to hear him say, since one of the aspects of the 'legend' about them had always been how perfect their relationship was until Naraku had shown up and ruined it.

I told him as much in that moment.

"I thought you two were the perfect couple. I can't imagine Kikyou ever being angry with you before all this happened."

"_I can't imagine her __**not**__ angry with me_._" _

Surprised by both his words as well as how articulate he was becoming – although I had _definitely _noticed how cold it was getting in the car – I'd cranked the heat and asked him to elaborate. The rest of the drive home was spent with me listening to Inuyasha talk over the static, the mildly annoying aspect of actually trying to make out his words through all the pops and crackles the furthest thought on my mind because I was _so _into what he was saying. Like I'd thought the night before, while playing with Souta's Ouija board, Inuyasha had indeed needed somebody to talk to, and I was only all too grateful that I was somebody who could listen. Even though I'd previously thought of Kikyou becoming like my first patient, I'd felt in that moment as if Inuyasha might qualify, instead.

I'd learned _way _more in the next half hour than the rumors floating around campus had _ever_ revealed.

I'd learned that Inuyasha and Kikyou had most definitely _not _been the perfect couple, but that instead, they'd had their share of petty fights, although they'd always made up afterwards. I learned that Inuyasha had been completely aware of Naraku's attraction to Kikyou because the guy had been threatening him on the side, telling him that _he _wasn't good enough for Kikyou and that she deserved somebody _better_, namely Naraku. I asked Inuyasha if it was because his father was American, assuring him that that fact didn't bother _me _in the slightest, and he confirmed my hypothesis that that wasdefinitelypart of Naraku's beef with him, although as far as he knew it hadn't been an issue with Kikyou, either. It had been his lack of _money _that had upset her most of the time, he explained; he hadn't been able to buy her nice enough dinners, nice enough jewelry, etc. When I asked him if she'd been aware of Naraku's infatuation and whether she might have even been leading Naraku on, or _even _having an _affair _with him, Inuyasha had actually laughed, and reminded me that it'd been the early '60s at the time andthat Kikyou had been _far _too 'proper' to have actually been sleeping with Naraku on the side, although whether or not she had been aware of his attraction, and whether or not she had tried to discourage it, he didn't know.

Thinking of Inuyasha's parents for a moment, I'd asked him then, as way of changing the subject, if he had any family members he'd like me to go speak to on his behalf, Ghost Whisperer style, but he'd told me then that both of his parents were dead and that he'd never been that close to his older half-brother, who was getting on in years, and so no, he didn't have anybody he wanted to speak to through me, although he'd thanked me for the offer.

Pulling up at the house, I told Inuyasha we'd talk more in a little while and changed the dial on Mom's radio back to her favorite station. After telling my mother how things had not gone according to plan, she offered me an encouraging hug and told me not to give up, that everything would work out as it was meant to, and that she had faith in me and was proud of me. Awestruck, humbled, and feeling my eyes tearing up, I'd grabbed a quick lunch from the fridge and headed back up to my room so that Inuyasha and I could talk some more.

It was less draining on his energy, and mine, if he spoke at a frequency that normally only a voice recorder could hear, and so even though it slowed our conversation down a little bit I used the recorder I'd borrowed from Eri to continue speaking with him in my room that afternoon. I'd ask him a question, wait a few long seconds, and then run it back to hear his reply. Most of the time I actually did hear his voice with my own ears, live, but just couldn't _quite _make out what he was saying, hearing it like a mumble, and so the voice recorder _was _a huge help. I figured an average person wouldn't have heard his whispered words with their own ears _at all_. I did have a gift, but I was also dealing with a very weak, tired ghost, who'd probably used more energy in the last two days than he had in the last two decades. I knew I'd need to come up with a steady way of powering him up so that we could communicate more normally, but one thing at a time.

Using the voice recorder, I learned that Inuyasha had actually been wanting to break things off with Kikyou for a while by the time that fateful Halloween night had rolled around, but that he'd been stalling, unsure of how to break it to her. He hadn't been about to indirectly tell Naraku that he'd won, giving the guy permission to be with Kikyou, because he'd been able to tell that something just wasn't right about that man, and so one of the main reasons he'd stayed with Kikyou even after wanting to break things off with her had been because he'd been worried that she'd be vulnerable to Naraku if left heartbroken. He'd never thought in a million years that the man would actually do what he did, but he _had _been worried about Kikyou being taken advantage of, of being used up and spat out afterwards, if she'd hypothetically fallen for Naraku on the rebound. He'd known the guy was trouble, he just hadn't known _how much_ trouble until it was too late.

Inuyasha said that the night of their deaths, that Halloween party fifty years ago, he had been pulled aside by two of Naraku's friends, just like the story on campus said, and at first they'd just engaged him in random, normal chitchat, until he'd tried to politely brush them off to get back to Kikyou. Then they'd suddenly become aggressive, holding him back, saying they'd had _orders –_ as if Naraku had been their crime boss or something – to not let him through just yet. Inuyasha explained that that'd already had him seeing red, and he'd been just about to deck them both when Kikyou's bloodcurdling scream had sent chills down his spine. He explained that the lackeys hadn't tried to hold him back after that, looking just as shocked as he'd felt, and that together the three of them had all rushed toward the sound of the scream. He said he believed that Naraku had probably told them he'd only wanted to talk to Kikyou, to try and woo her and he'd wanted Inuyasha out of the way in order to do so. He didn't believe they'd been in on her murder.

Arriving on scene, Kikyou had looked dead, although looking back on it now he told me that she'd probably been unconscious and not actually dead just yet.

I agreed that that was the most likely explanation, since it explained the gap in time I'd previously been puzzling over. Kikyou's ghost couldn't have witnessed Inuyasha's fight with Naraku if she hadn't actually been dead yet, still alive but unconscious, in the process of bleeding out.

He told me that seeing Naraku dressed in his exact costume, something that had obviously taken a lot of premeditation and planning, had been the last straw, realizing that Kikyou had probably died believing he'd killed her. Why the hell _else _would Naraku have pulled such a stunt? Losing it, his mind had snapped, and even though Naraku hadn't murdered the woman he'd _loved, _since he'd no longer 'loved' loved Kikyou, that hadn't mattered, since he'd still cared about her as a friend and had wanted to protect her from Naraku. He'd failed, in the worst way possible. Ripping his mask off not because he'd wanted the spectators to see his face but simply because it'd hindered his vision, not even thinking about the fact that there were witnesses since he'd had tunnel vision, focusing only on Naraku and himself, he'd immediately gone after Kikyou's slayer, tackling him to the ground and making a grab for the knife in his hand. The rest of it had played out pretty much just like how the legend goes at school, that he'd managed to slash up Naraku pretty good but had unfortunately missed any major arteries, and then when Naraku had gotten his hands back on the knife he'd managed to work it into Inuyasha's own chest.

After he finished relaying all that, I'd then gotten to hear what I imagined no other living person ever had. A first-hand account, from a ghost, on what it was like to die.

Inuyasha described his pain, both physical and emotional, as he knew he'd lied dying, feeling his lifeblood pour out of him, feeling his body grow colder. He'd gotten sleepy, then, finding it difficult to stay conscious, and with all the screaming and panicked voices buzzing all around him slowly fading away into indistinguishable white noise he'd allowed himself to fall asleep. The next thing he knew, he'd said, was that he was looking down on the whole scene, as if floating a couple dozen feet above the ground. He recalled seeing the paramedics rushing up to Naraku's body as well as his own, his own body getting draped with a sheet once they'd realized there was nothing they could do for him. He'd then seen the same thing happen to Kikyou's body, and he'd felt a pang in his heart; his spiritual one since his physical one had no longer existed. How he'd longed to see her again, to talk to her again, even just one last time, to say he was sorry, to say goodbye. He'd suddenly found himself standing on the school grounds, then, firetruck lights flickering all around, seeming out of focus, people buzzing all around him even though they couldn't see him, and it'd been hard for him to focus on what anybody was saying or doing, as if they'd been moving at a different rate of speed than he was, even though he hadn't been able to tell if they were moving slower than him or faster than him. It'd seemed like both at the same time, somehow.

He'd seen Kikyou, then, standing just a few feet before him, her body still, with the blurred, rushed craziness passing by behind her and all around them. He'd reached out his hand towards her, called out her name, and she'd narrowed her eyes at him and clinched her fists, letting out a horrible shriek like the banshee she was; an earsplitting screech that had snapped him out of his fuzzy state and had plunged him into the 'real' world, the police and students rushing around them suddenly coming into perfect clarity. It had only taken him a fraction of a second to get his barrings, spotting Kikyou still standing before him, and ignoring the people who were ignoring him, knowing they couldn't see or _feel _him as some of them walked right through him as if he were made of air, he'd called Kikyou's name again, and then she'd turned her head, looking away from him, and then her body had slowly faded away from sight, simply vanishing. He told me how it'd been like that ever since then, that every time Kikyou would be somewhere, trying to talk to the students who were trying to talk to her, he'd approach her and she'd leave. He could 'sense' her even when she was invisible to him, but whenever he started to apologize, started to explain, she'd actually disappear, and he could feel her absence, knowing she had left completely.

He also revealed that she could tap _his _energy, and that one of the reasons he was so weak whenever the two of them were together was because she'd strengthen herself off of his spirit, literally consuming his life-force, both to fuel herself and to shut him up, since it'd make him unable to communicate with her. He assured me that she couldn't really _hurt _him, that a ghost couldn't really cease to exist – you can't kill what's already dead – but he said gathering their energy into themselves to maintain _themselves _was sometimes difficult to do, and that if weakened then their consciousness was more just _there _without form or substance until they were stronger again.

Trying to wrap my mind around that concept, I'd likened it to how we need to sleep in order to recharge ourselves, and he'd said it was a close enough analogy. Ghosts didn't really _sleep _per se, but they could lose focus of their consciousness for a while, their thoughts everywhere but at the same time not really anywhere, until they became aware of themselves and their surroundings again, once again able to focus their energy to a single location, and so it was basically like being asleep, more or less.

So every time he'd tried to approach Kikyou and explain himself, she'd sucked his energy away until he'd fallen asleep and then disappeared on him.

What a bitch.

Too bad for her she couldn't pull that stunt with _me_.

I was definitely not done dealing with her yet. I was determined I'd find a way to get through to her, with or without her family's help.

With Inuyasha having just about used up all the energy he'd had left in that moment to finish filling me in on all the details I'd needed to know, I'd told him to go ahead and go do whatever he needed to do, go wherever he needed to go, even if that was technically 'nowhere', until he was able to communicate again. I told him to just contact me again in a simple, non-draining way to let me know he was back whenever he was ready, and with that said we said our goodnights and I went back downstairs for dinner, keeping the topic of conversation light since Grandpa was still none the wiser.

~o~o~o~o~o~

The next day I left Inuyasha alone, knowing he'd contact me again when he was ready, when he was able, and so after a quick shower I spent a good chunk of the morning doing additional online research, beyond just the story of Kikyou's death, as I explored other ghost stories and basically the paranormal field in its entirety. I wanted to know how I could help fuel Inuyasha, for one thing, and also if there was such a thing as a way to 'trap' Kikyou and force her to listen to us. I didn't want to accidentally exorcise or otherwise hurt her, though, and so I knew I had to be careful. Now that I knew ghosts were real, I also believed in witchcraft. 'Magic' was just a fancy word for science that the laymen of the time didn't understand. Since there was obviously such a thing as spiritual energy, that meant there was such a thing as _screwing _with that energy in the wrong way. I didn't want to try and summon Kikyou with a spell that'd leave the 'door' open for whatever _else _wanted to come through besides or _instead_ of Kikyou.

Figuring it wouldn't hurt anything to sit on the Kikyou problem for a few days as I mulled over my various options, I decided to at least take care of Inuyasha's energy source, and after deciding that it'd be as good an idea as any other, I ran out to the store and bought a little electric space heather. The kind that looked like a small desk fan but didn't actually have a motor or blade to move the air at all, and instead just used infrared, radiant heat. Getting it home, I put all the loose items on top of my desk away in the drawers so that the area was nice and safe, no risk of scratch paper catching on fire, and then turning the heater on I said in a playful tone, "Here, I bought you a present." before exiting my room, shutting the door behind me as I headed downstairs for lunch.

Going back into my room a few hours later I immediately noticed that it didn't feel anywhere _near _as warm as it _should _have, and after double-checking that the unit was working properly, which it was, I smiled to myself, pleased, as I grabbed a fresh set of pajamas and went into the hall bath to change. I knew I was being silly, especially since, if he'd _wanted _to peep, I knew he could have still very easily done so, but it was just the principle of the thing, I supposed.

Going back into my room afterwards it still didn't feel as warm as it should have, and I asked my empty room, "So is that going to work okay for you?"

I immediately heard a very distinguishable, male _"Yes, thank you_._"_ in reply, and I smiled, reining in my sudden urge to squee in excitement like a teenager. I was such a genius.

"Good, I'm glad." I replied, explaining how I wouldn't be able to use the space heater at the dorm because they weren't allowed, but that I planned on coming home every weekend for the time being so that we'd always have the weekends free in order to figure the Kikyou thing out.

"_You've already done so much_..._" _

"Well, you're welcome, but I'm not giving up, so if you were going to tell me that if I can't get her to listen to me to not worry about it then just forget it. This is apparently my calling, and even though I can't say _why _I'm obsessing over helping your ex I _will _help her, for both our sakes as well as hers. I feel sorry for you in your own torment, too, you know. Wouldn't you like to be free from this guilt? And I know I'd never be able to walk away from you two now without it resolved; I'd hate myself forever and feel like I'd abandoned you. Once I start something, I see it through to the end. That's the way I've always been."

"_You can't walk away_..._I'd just haunt you_..._" _had been his reply to my mini-speech, with a noticeable chuckle added to the end so that I knew he was just teasing, and I laughed, too.

Heading downstairs for dinner, the evening meal with my family passed by uneventfully, as normal, and then going back up to my room afterwards I excused my early retirement by saying I had some school assignments I needed to study for, instead of staying up downstairs to watch TV with the family for a while like I normally would have. Even though I _did _have school work I needed to get to I put that off, though, and Inuyasha and I spent the next hour or so talking before I went to bed. I needed to get up early the next morning, after all, since it was a school day and I had to first go back to the dorm to drop off my overnight bag. Mom gave me a ride in the morning, and she also agreed to come pick me up after my last class the following Friday, understanding the _real _reason why I'd be coming home every weekend until further notice while we just told my grandfather that I'd been feeling homesick lately.

Meeting Eri in our room before class, she'd asked me excitedly how it'd gone and I'd had to tell her the disappointing truth, that my first attempt at being a 'ghost whisperer' hadn't gone as well as planned and was still a work in progress. She'd slumped her shoulders at that one, clearly disappointed, as she told me she'd been hoping she could post our Halloween video online and how Ayumi and Yuka were both just _dying _to tell their other friends about our experience, 'no pun intended'. Chuckling at that one, I'd made an executive decision in that moment, telling her to go ahead and post it and spread word all she wanted about what'd happened at the graveyard, on _one condition_. People were already aware of Kikyou's ghost on campus, anyway, or at least the rumors of it, and a lot of them tried to summon her on a semi-regular basis, so I hadn't honestly seen any harm in adding yet one more story into the rumor mill. But there _were _no stories of _Inuyasha's _ghost still hanging around, and I wanted to _keep_ it that way. If she and the girls could fib a little bit and omit the Inuyasha parts, then they could tell everyone the first part of the story, of everything up until our video cut out right after the flashlights went crazy, and the story could just go that we hightailed it out of there right after that'd happened, like any _sane _person probably _would _have done, anyway; like they'd all wanted to do before _I _had felt the need, the urge to stay.

Why I'd been so adamant that nobody else find out about Inuyasha, I hadn't been sure, although I'd told myself it was just because I hadn't wanted random people to bother him, if he felt his spirit start to get pushed and pulled in different directions from different people trying to summon him. Honestly, I'd still had no idea how that whole thing worked, since that was one thing we hadn't talked about yet. I wasn't sure if it was like on Beetlejuice, where he'd have no choice but to appear wherever summoned, or if he'd have the ability to ignore them. I had supposed it probably depended on if they did the spell right, but I hadn't wanted to take any chances.

I'd also admitted, silently to myself, that a little part of me was selfish and simply hadn't wanted to share him. Inuyasha was _my _ghost friend; everyone else could go find their own.

Of course, originally I'd wanted to spare Kikyou what would probably be an influx of people trying to summon _her_, too, just to be nice, as a courtesy, since I'd thought that maybe it was annoying for her, but in that moment I just hadn't cared. After the way she'd yelled at me two days prior and had broken that mirror in my face, I was kind of irked with her in that moment and so I'd figured that if she got bothered by pestering students trying to play with her as a result of us talking about what'd happened then that was what she got for not letting me help her over the weekend.

Bitter?

Maybe a tad, but really, I'd still wanted to help her, no matter how much of a bitch I was beginning to realize she actually was. Nobody deserved what'd happened to her, and so stuck up bitch prior to her murder or not, I'd still genuinely felt sorry for her and her plight. I'd also really begun to feel like I was developing a genuine friendship with Inuyasha by that point, and so I'd still wanted to help Kikyou for his sake, as well, and so I'd refused to let _her _bitterness discourage me for that reason, if nothing else. Maybe if it'd only been between me and Kikyou I would've let her chase me away by then, I would've given up, knowing she didn't want my help and figuring that I should just leave her alone, but this wasn't just about _her_.Her continuing to wallow in her own misery was in turn making Inuyasha miserable, as well, and while I'd felt sorry for her I'd _really _felt sorry for _him_, and had actually wanted to help him more than her by that point. I would help Kikyou, for Inuyasha, no matter what.

_For Inuyasha_...

Eri must have been able to tell how serious I'd been with my condition, with how passionately I'd felt that Inuyasha's existence needed to stay our little secret, and so whatever thoughts had gone through her head at the time she'd readily agreed, telling me she understood and that she'd make sure the girls understood as well. Fortunately our video evidence only featured the flashlight trick with Kikyou; Inuyasha hadn't shown himself until after I'd thought to try and call out for him, and that hadn't happened until after the camera had gone dead. We had audio evidence of him from the voice recorder, but so Eri had agreed to not share that part, and only post the actual video online. People were much more into video files than strictly audio, anyway. Half the student body or more would probably just assume the audio recording had been faked. _Seeing _was believing, not _hearing_. So since the best of our evidence was free and clear it actually made Eri ecstatic to know that she could now post it on her homepage without facing my wrath; I told her I appreciated what a true friend she and the others were being for actually complying with my wishes in the first place and not just posting it anyway even back when I'd asked them not to.

Brushing off my gratitude while stating again that she understood, Eri excused herself for class, then, and I wasn't far behind her, my first class of the day starting in about an hour.

~o~o~o~o~o~

The rest of the week seemed to zip by in a blur. I was pseudo-famous for a couple of days after Eri's video went localized-viral around campus, but she, Yuka and Ayumi got the majority of the attention seeing as they were actually in the footage while I was behind the camera. That was fine with me, though; I was happy to let Kikyou's fan club hound those three and leave me alone. Whether they hounded Kikyou herself or not I wasn't sure, and didn't honestly care. I, as strange as it seemed for a college girl, spent the time concentrating on my studies. Of course, those studies were split between my _actual _schoolwork and those of a more ghostly nature, but I had been studying nonetheless. Inuyasha did a few little things whenever I asked him to, just to reassure me that he was still with me, but we usually didn't speak for more than ten minutes at a time whenever I could squeeze it in, using my cell to my ear for him to give me 'yes'and 'no'taps more often than anything else. When I wasn't in class I was at the library, lamenting its lack of an ancient occult section as seen in so many TV shows and movies; I spent most of my time online.

Come Thursday night, having decided I'd given Kikyou enough time to cool off after our last encounter, I decided to try and discreetly contact her on campus after hours. There weren't any parties that night, so the paths between dorm buildings had fortunately been pretty deserted. With Inuyasha giving me subtle double-taps on either my left or right shoulder to indicate which direction he'd wanted me to turn, it didn't take long for him to steer me towards the exact area on school grounds where Kikyou had been murdered. He'd told me he could feel that Kikyou's energy often lingered in that area, and once I got there I heard him murmur quietly in my ear that she was there before I felt his presence back away from me, like a spot of cold air moving away, the area around me feeling warmer all of a sudden. I knew why he'd backed off, so that Kikyou would hopefully not feel as if the two of us were ganging up on her.

Sitting down on the lawn right beside the concrete path where her body had fallen, I didn't worry about pretending to speak on my cell since nobody else was around, and called out Kikyou's name, asking her if she was there. Getting no reaction, and not sure whether to feel disappointed or relieved, if it'd meant she had already left or was actually going to listen without throwing a tantrum, I decided to plow forward, figuring I had nothing to lose.

"Maybe you're unaware of the story we've been telling about you here on campus for the last fifty years," I'd started, "maybe you've never heard it, never noticed, but the story that every student here knows is that Naraku had gotten jealous of you and Inuyasha being together, and somehow finding out what costume he was wearing, Naraku bought the same one and had his friends distract Inuyasha while he took his place. That walk you took, to this location, that man by your side had been Naraku, not Inuyasha. The man who'd suddenly pulled out a knife and stabbed you in the heart had been Naraku, not-"

I paused as a sudden, chilly gust of wind flowed through the area, rustling the drying leaves of the nearby deciduous trees.

"It's true, honest." I said then, imploring, "Just hear me out, please."

I'd then proceeded to quote from memory what I could about the original police report, and how Inuyasha had been found DOA, as had she, but that Naraku had been rushed to the local hospital, suffering from some severe knife wounds but none that had been immediately life threatening. He had been in critical condition, but they'd saved him, and then he'd stood trial, although it'd pretty much been an open and shut case. His state appointed lawyer had attempted a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity, but they'd decided it'd been premeditated, seeing as how he'd been wearing Inuyasha's costume and had been in possession of a hidden knife and all that. The jury had thankfully realized the same thing Inuyasha himself had realized when he'd first arrived on scene to witness Naraku as his double standing over Kikyou's body; it had been meticulously planned out.

The wind had gotten stronger and stronger, and colder, as I'd continued speaking, but I hadn't given up, even when sand had started flying in my face again. Turning my head away I'd still continued to tell her about how Naraku went to jail and was still alive, still in jail to that day. Basically I'd told her all the same things I'd already told her one week prior, on Halloween night, and basically she'd reacted the same way as she had back then, too, but I at least knew she was hearing my words. I'd seriously doubted that ghosts could cover their ears and go _la la la _since they didn't really _have _ears anymore.

"Kikyou, appear to me, please. Speak to me. Let's talk this out." I pleaded then, not caring that I'd sounded like I was begging her, since I was. I'd felt out of options, unsure of what else I could possibly do if she would simply never believe a word I said.

Miraculously, she appeared in that moment, standing directly in front of me, over the spot on the concrete walkway where she'd fallen. She was still dressed in her Halloween costume, a very beautiful, kind of old-world-y looking off-white dress, but the gruesome blood stains were fortunately absent this time around.

"_Inuyasha betrayed me_._"_ she stated, her voice strangely distant despite the fact that she was less than three feet away. Her words, and her eyes, were angry.

"Betrayed you how?" I asked.

Sure, I knew Inuyasha hadn't actually been in love with her anymore, and had wanted to break up with her, but I wasn't going to bring any of _that _up unless _she _did because I had no idea how much of that she knew, if any. That wasn't really a betrayal in my book, though. In fact he'd stayed with her to protect her, despite his feelings, because he had in fact still cared for her deeply enough to want to protect her from harm. I could see the argument that he'd _failed _her, but he hadn't _betrayed _her.

"Inuyasha betrayed me." she repeated, that time with her voice sounding like it was actually coming from the image of her form before me.

"He failed to protect you from Naraku, and he's sorry. He tried to avenge you and lost his own life in the process, so he's already paid his penance for failing to protect you. A death for a death. You should forgive him."

"He wanted me dead." she answered, and I furrowed my brows.

"Inuyasha didn't want you dead. He'd had no idea Naraku was going to-"

"**Naraku told me!"** she interrupted, shouting the words so violently, with such a burst of energy, that her hair flew crazily and I got blasted in the face with icy wind and sand.

I'd had to close my eyes against it, protecting my face with my hands, and once the air seemed to calm down and I opened my eyes again Kikyou was of course long gone. But I wasn't alone.

"What did she mean, Naraku told her...?" I questioned myself, just talking to myself, as I climbed up onto my feet.

"I have no idea." Inuyasha said, suddenly standing beside me, which caused me to jump in surprise with my hand on my chest. In the week we'd known each other he'd usually only spoken to me as a disembodied voice, so I still wasn't used to it whenever he'd put forth the extra effort needed to fully manifest.

"Jeez, give a girl a heart attack." I scolded playfully.

Not disappearing right away, he actually chuckled, and said "Keh" before his body faded away slowly, becoming transparent before disappearing entirely.

I'd gotten used to his _Kehs _by then, and their various shades of meaning. That one had been a fake apology, the kind of 'sorry' you say when you think it's funny and you aren't _actually _sorry.

"Anyway," I spoke back up as I began walking back to my dorm, knowing he was still with me even though I could no longer see him, "you don't know what she meant by saying Naraku had told her? You don't know _what _he could have told her?"

"_Lies, apparently_..._" _

"I agree with that much. Clearly, Naraku told her something about you that's now making her think you betrayed her. I wonder if he'd somehow previously told her that he suspected _you _might kill her, so that when it happened, she especially believes it was you because Naraku had forewarned her that you would?"

"_You should ask Naraku_..._"_

"If only it were that simple." I replied, before realizing, _Wait a minute, why __can't__ I ask Naraku?_

He _was _still alive, after all, and it wasn't as if he were in a maximum security penitentiary that wouldn't allow visitors. There was no viable reason why I couldn't go about making a trip down to the prison where he was being held and arrange to speak with him just like other visitors of other prisoners often did.

"You're a genius." I said then, since he'd been silent the last few minutes while I'd contemplated.

"_I know_..._" _he replied, and we both laughed.

~o~o~o~o~o~

I never, _ever _want to visit a prison _ever _again, but I made it through it.

Having decided to skip my morning class on Friday to look into it, I'd gotten all of my arrangements figured out and went out there first thing Saturday, one week after what I was playfully calling the 'Tsubaki debacle'. I'd prayed my encounter with Naraku would be more successful. My mom had offered to go with me, but I'd braved going it alone, figuring I was a grown woman and could handle myself. It'd helped knowing I had my invisible body guard with me every step of the way, of course, Inuyasha having sworn he wouldn't let anybody hurt me. It wasn't really as if anyone _could _have hurt me, unless a jail break riot had just happened to go down while I was there, which thankfully didn't happen. I got lewd comments shouted at me left and right, but I'd known that that would happen going in and it honestly hadn't fazed me much.

My uneasy feeling hadn't really had anything to do with the various prisoners ogling me. It was all the ghosts of all the prisoners who'd _died _there, that I could sense, that'd given me the heebie-jeebies. I'd never been around a heavy concentration of ghosts like that before, and my 'ghost whisperer' question had been answered once and for all with all the scores of shadow people, and even a few full-bodied apparitions, I'd seen coming and going all over the place. Once they'd realized I could see them a lot of them had disappeared, but some had actually stayed and glared at me, as if offended by my audacity to look at them. Murmuring under my breath so the guard wouldn't hear for Inuyasha to stay close to me, I'd felt relieved when the air around me had suddenly gotten much colder, as if he'd wrapped himself around me. He could feed off of my body heat to stay tethered to me as much as he wanted; in that place, in that moment, I knew I'd much rather be freezing than alone.

Escorted into a room where the guard had thankfully stayed with me, another guard who was followed by a man in cliché orange entered through a different door not long after, the latter taking a seat at the table opposite me. The prisoner was clearly an older gentleman, but he'd taken care of himself and seemed to be in pretty good health. I'd supposed that having nothing much to do with your time but work out in the yard lifting weights would keep most people in pretty good shape. His hair was short, and being so much older now he'd really looked nothing like the photos of him I'd found online, but I knew right away that I was sitting face to face with Naraku.

I wasn't afraid.

And as it'd turned out, I'd had nothing to be afraid of, anyway.

The man was somber, but didn't seem violent, and he'd easily bought my cover story that I was writing an article for the school paper because of the fiftieth anniversary of the murders. He didn't question me on why I was late, seeing as the actual anniversary had been nine days prior. In fact it'd seemed like he'd been waiting all that time for somebody to talk to. Either that, or the anniversary had weighed heavily on his own mind – or Kikyou really _had _paid him a visit, but if so he didn't say. He _had _immediately broken down the story for me, though, giving me all of the details from his perspective that up until that very moment had remained a total mystery to us all. I was glad I'd borrowed Eri's Kodak again and, with his awareness, was filming the interview. I'd expected him to maybe be defiant, like the prisoners on Law & Order who don't want to talk, wanting to know what's in it for them, but he was an old man with a weight he'd wanted to get off his shoulders, and so it'd all come pouring out.

First and foremost he'd told me how he'd just found out in passing what their costumes were going to be, through a friend of a friend's girlfriend who'd been friends with Kikyou, and that the idea for his 'master plan' hadn't come to him until after he'd realized that since Inuyasha's costume had included a face mask he'd be able to pull off becoming his duplicate. It'd just been too perfect of an opportunity to let go to waste, he'd said, explaining how all the wheels in his head had started turning. He told me how he'd already known by then that Kikyou was a lost cause to him, and he'd already known going in that he was going to kill her, but _then _he'd told me the one little piece of information the rest of us had never known. He'd admitted that, at the moment of plunging the knife into her heart, he'd told her that Inuyasha had _hired _him to kill her. His exact words to her had been _'Courtesy of Inuyasha; he said to tell you he never loved you, and asked me to get rid of you for him_._' _

When I asked Naraku why he'd gone out of his way to say such a thing when she would have just thought Inuyasha had killed her anyway, since he was wearing the same costume and all, he'd said that that _had _been his original intention, to just silently kill her and let her wonder why Inuyasha had done it, but he'd said that Kikyou had actually realized who he was, and had suspiciously questioned what his intentions were to pull such a stunt as replacing Inuyasha, and so then saying he'd been there on Inuyasha's behest had just popped into his mind at the last minute as a way to salvage his agenda. He'd succeeded, since Kikyou had believed him, and _that _explained why everyone had stated how she'd died repeating over and over again _'Why, Inuyasha, why' _and such. Never once had she said Naraku's name, because in her mind she'd still thought that Inuyasha was ultimately to blame, and so that explained why the legend on campus had developed the way that it had.

Telling Naraku really vaguely that some people on campus believed the ghost of Kikyou still walked the grounds, and asking him what he'd like to say to Kikyou if that were true, I had him look directly into the camera, and he'd complied, telling Kikyou herself that he was sorry, and that he'd been a sick man back then and had been jealous of Inuyasha's happiness, having wanted Inuyasha out of the picture so that it could be the two of them together, instead. Feeling as if Inuyasha had actually been the one who'd stolen Kikyou away from _him_, because, as Naraku'd explained it, in his mind Kikyou _would have been _his had Inuyasha not gotten to her first, he'd then felt like paying him back by taking Kikyou away from him, as well, so that neither of them could have her. Beginning to cry, he'd begged Kikyou to forgive him, and then Inuyasha, too, since of course he'd ended up killing Inuyasha as well. He'd apologized to Inuyasha for the entire thing, for killing Kikyou and blaming him, and for killing him, himself, as well as how he'd previously been harassing and threatening him behind Kikyou's back, trying to bully him into leaving Kikyou.

I felt the pocket of coldness that'd stayed with me the whole time, my little personal, perpetual winter, start to shift around me in that moment, the left side of my body feeling warmer, and then I felt the sensation of a hand gripping my right shoulder, patting it gently a couple of times.

I smiled, truly proud of Inuyasha in that moment.

"I think, for the sake of everyone just needing to accept that the past is the past and it cannot be changed, that Inuyasha would forgive you, for the good of both of your souls."

My words only made Naraku cry even harder, and starting to feel kind of awkward I gave the security guard a _look _and he quickly rushed to Naraku's side and ushered him to his feet and out the door. Before he left, Naraku turned my way and actually thanked me for coming to see him. He said I was such a pretty, young thing, and that I could come back to see him again any time I wanted.

Uh, no.

"You take care of yourself, Naraku. You've let your burden go, so now it's time for you to forgive yourself, as well." was my reply.

He'd only nodded, and that was the last I saw of him. I'd quickly had my guard escort me out and once I got in Mom's car I didn't even look in the rear view mirror until I'd turned and the prison was no longer in its reflection.

Feeling the temperature start to drop in the car, which I'd suspected Inuyasha had started doing at times as a subtle way of letting me know he was there more than just because he'd needed the energy, because I knew he knew I didn't like being startled when my mind was elsewhere, I reached for the control panel and clicked on both the heater and the radio, tuning the latter to the static for him.

During my drive back home we discussed his decision to forgive Naraku, and he'd explained that he'd just felt sorry for the man, seeing how pathetic he'd become, as well as feeling grateful that at least Naraku had admitted his guilt and had admitted he'd been mentally deranged at the time. The tragic irony of it all, which I would never tell Naraku, was that if he hadn't come off so creepy, and hadn't been threatening Inuyasha so much and making his obsession for Kikyou so obvious, then Inuyasha'd said that he probably would have broken things off with Kikyou long before that Halloween, and unconcerned, he wouldn't have interfered if Naraku had started to date her. Naraku was unaware that Inuyasha's feelings for Kikyou had waned and that he'd only stayed with her to protect her from him, and during the drive Inuyasha and I had both agreed that neither Naraku nor Kikyou needed to be made aware of that minor detail.

Getting back home, new video evidence in hand, Inuyasha agreed with me that it'd be better to let Kikyou cool back off again before trying to shove the truth of Naraku's admittance in her face _right _away, and so we took it easy over the weekend. He went off to go do whatever ghosts do and I actually spent time enjoying my family, watching TV in the living room instead of staying holed up in my bedroom upstairs obsessing over ghosts.

~o~o~o~o~o~

With the weekend zipping by it was back to school again on Monday, and having saved the video to my laptop I gave Eri back her digital camera, telling her what'd happened. She'd told me I was crazy for actually going down to the prison to speak to Naraku in person, but had then commended me for doing something so 'totally awesome', saying that it was phenomenal how well my encounter with him had gone. I'd readily agreed.

Feeling that it was time to get back to my studies, my college related ones, I'd put thoughts of ghosts on the back burner for the next few days, for the most part at least, and had actually spent my time in my dorm room studying schoolwork in between classes. Go figure. I did let Inuyasha pick all the music on my iPod, though. Testing his limitations, we'd discovered that he couldn't manipulate electronics fully, and couldn't go into the 'brain' of my laptop to select whatever song he wanted in my iTunes library while the program was 'behind' the one I was working in, but manipulating my old style iPod was just like the flashlight trick, slowly turning applied pressure around on the wheel and pushing the button. That, he could do, and so with it connected to some speakers I was listening to what I'd playfully dubbed 'ghost shuffle' as I did my homework. Eri thought that that was 'totally awesome' too.

Try as I did to let the whole Kikyou thing rest for a few days I was still plagued with thoughts of her. I'd tried my best to put her out of my mind, but by the time Wednesday had rolled around I was already arguing with myself over whether or not I should try to contact her again the following night. It wasn't as if I'd thought Thursday was an auspicious day for some reason, it was just the fact that letting it go for more than a week between 'sessions' had seemed like too large of a gap, to me. Kikyou might've had eternity but I sure didn't, and so a large part of me had been anxious to get the whole thing over and done with, even though I'd also still felt like I was up against a wall, in a way, unable to really _do_ anything no matter how hard I tried. I had felt as if I'd made progress, of course, finally knowing what Kikyou had believed all this time and knowing what I needed to tell her, but I'd been unsure of how to get her to actually _listen_, to actually cooperate and watch the video. She thought Inuyasha had filled _my_ head with _his_ lies, and so I knew I had to tell her that I'd gone and seen Naraku, I knew she had to hear it from Naraku himself and not me, but what if she didn't believe me and wouldn't even watch it? Or worse, what if she didn't even believe that it was Naraku on the tape? My 'what if's had been running away with me. The one thing I knew had going for me was how Naraku had quoted the exact words he'd whispered to her, something that obviously nobody else would know, but she had to be willing to actually _watch _the video, first. That was the part I'd been struggling with in that moment.

I'd tried to let go of my obsession as I'd settled into bed that night, but thoughts of Kikyou refusing to listen to me had apparently stuck with me more intently than I'd realized. Unable to fall asleep for what had felt like forever, I'd lied there awake for what had to have been at least a couple of hours, the last two weeks replaying in my head over and over again. I tried to tell myself it was what it was, and that since I was so new at this I should cut myself some slack, but what'd made me feel like the biggest failure wasn't my inability to pacify a ghost, like I was a bad medium, it was my inability to comfort a hurting twenty-year-old woman, like I was a bad _therapist_. If I'd really been thinking of Kikyou as a patient no different from any other then what did that mean for my future in psychology? Because I knew just yelling the truth at people and telling them to suck it up wasn't exactly the best way to bring about the 'healing process' in most cases. If Kikyou's situation really _was _different because she was a ghost, and therein lied the difference, then I needed to learn to _think _of her as a ghost in my head, and accept that difference. Otherwise, I knew, if I really _did _feel in my heart that she really was still a real woman no different from any other, then I needed to find a new approach. A gentler approach. A therapeutic approach.

I don't know what time it was when I finally nodded off, but I'd eventually drifted off into dreamland. It was a visit to dreamland I would never, _ever _forget.

Now, I've always been able to remember at least bits and pieces of my dreams the following day, though I never used to pay very much attention to my dreams for very long after waking up, as I'm sure is the case with most people. Aside from the occasional really _awesome _dream, or really creepy nightmare, it would normally all just fade away after a little while, blending together into obscure nothingness.

That would never be the case with _this _dream, which I'll probably remember for the rest of my life. Like most dreams I can't really remember how it'd started, but the vivid part that still sticks out even to this day is how I'd been talking to Kikyou, standing with her one-on-one in my dorm room, and she'd been dressed in normal clothes for whatever reason, and we'd been arguing. I'd been almost to the point of tears, pleading with her to listen to me, and I'd felt so horrible, so stupid and useless and _worthless _for not being able to help her let go of her hatred, to realize Inuyasha had not been responsible for her murder and that Naraku had lied to her, and that even he was repentant now and so really what would be best for her would be for her to just forgive and forget, put the past behind her, let it go, allow peace to wash over her and just _move on _into whatever place it was that she was destined to 'move on' to. She had been saying things back to me like 'why should I listen to a stupid, ugly nobody like you' and other really hurtful, but also really vague replies, not really rebuffing my arguments directly like the real Kikyou had done when she'd called me a liar, not that that'd dawned on me in the dream, of course.

Almost feeling at my wit's end, I remember that it was in that moment that Inuyasha had suddenly appeared. I'd turned around and there he was, also standing in my dorm room, still dressed in his Halloween costume, and even though my addled dream-mind apparently hadn't remembered Inuyasha's existence prior to his appearance, because looking back on it I hadn't been wondering where he was or wishing he were there prior to his arrival, as soon as I'd seen him I'd nearly knocked him over in my relief, I'd rushed up to him so fast. Proclaiming my gratitude that he was there I'd asked him, desperately, to help me get Kikyou to listen.

Instead of jumping into it, he'd merely stood there looking at me with a soft, caring smile on his lips, and then reaching up with his right hand to brush some stray hair back behind my left ear, he'd told me in a gentle voice, "She isn't the real Kikyou, Kagome. This is just a dream. You're beating yourself up over nothing."

I remember feeling surprised by his words, but then a sense of realization had come over me, as I'd suddenly known he was right, it _was _a dream, and as I'd turned back to look in Kikyou's direction, she was no longer there.

I'd then looked back in Inuyasha's direction, and he was still there, smiling proudly at me now because I'd made my phantom Kikyou go away.

"I guess that means you're not really real, either, if this is a dream." I recall I'd said in that moment, and his smile grew the tiniest bit playful.

"On the contrary, I'm the real deal."

I gasped in surprise.

And that's when I woke up.

Bolting into a sitting position in my bed, Eri, who'd already been awake and getting dressed, jumped because I'd startled her and immediately asked me what was wrong. I quickly brushed it off, telling her it was just a weird dream and that I already couldn't remember most of it, and then getting up and dressed myself, I'd waited until she left for her first class and Inuyasha and I were alone to ask him if that really _had _been him and, if it was, to let him know that I'd lied to Eri and I actually _did _remember the dream, vividly.

"Inuyasha...this is going to sound dumb, but-" I'd started, a loud single knock interrupting me before I could even finish. A single knock meant _no _so I'd immediately wondered if he was rebuking my claim of my pending question sounding stupid.

Feeling a little optimistic, then, I'd asked, "So..._was _that really you in my dream just now?"

I immediately received two knocks.

Delighted, but also surprised, I'd told him how I hadn't been aware that he could do that, and his response had been to whisper in my ear to turn on the voice recorder. I immediately did as asked, and over the next couple of minutes I could hear the sound of his mumbling, and correctly assumed he was conserving energy by speaking within the voice recorder's range. I could pick up a few words but couldn't really understand him; if I hadn't had my gift, I wouldn't have heard him at all. Once he was done with his speech I heard him clearly say "Okay, run it back." and once again I immediately did as asked.

He'd explained to me that he normally couldn't communicate that way with total strangers, entering their dreams like he'd done with me, because it required a temporary merging of his soul with the other person's soul, and unless the recipient knew him and subconsciously found the feel of his aura familiar and welcome such an invasion would almost definitely cause that other person to wake up the minute he tried it. He said he hadn't known what would happen when he tried it with me, but that I'd been talking in my sleep, so he'd known I was having a nightmare about Kikyou, and he'd felt compelled to try and snap me out of it one way or another. He knew he would either reach me, or the feel of him trying would wake me up, but either way his goal had been to wake me so it would have been fine. He said he hadn't been able to just sit back and watch me toss and turn because he'd really started to consider me a friend, and so he'd wanted to spare me from my self-torture. I'd felt truly touched when he'd said that part, and stopping the playback for a moment I'd told him that I considered him a friend, too. He was quickly becoming my _best_ friend.

Playing the rest of his recording, he'd also said that since he was usually too weak to communicate with anyone directly, anyone who didn't have my gift, at least, it was in dreams that he'd spoken with his own loved ones back in the day, having come to both his mother and father in their dreams shortly after his death to tell them goodbye.

Reaching the end of his recorded message, I told him that he could enter my dreams whenever he wanted, if communicating that way with me would also be easier for him, although I warned that the shock of knowing it was a dream and really him might wake me up again. I told him I'd never had a lucid dream before and didn't know if I could master it, the ability to stay asleep _knowing _it was a dream, and that he might just have to play along with my dream-self to keep me from waking up, saying whatever he wanted to say, which I'd then remember and understand after waking.

As a whisper in my ear, he said it was something we'd have to work on, together, but that he had faith in me, that maybe one day I could know it was a dream and still stay asleep. His faith in me made me silently vow to myself that one day I _would _master it.

I'd then proceeded to tell him that I wasn't worried about the real Kikyou ever trying to enter my dreams like that, because first of all she didn't seem to want to have anything to do with me, I'd said with a laugh, but then I'd added that I knew that even if she _did _try to mess with me in my sleep, he would be able to feel it and also come into my dream to protect me from her. I felt him grab my hand and give it a little squeeze after I said that part, and then he whispered directly into my ear that he'd never let her hurt me, whether it was the real her or just my own fantasy.

Feeling my cheeks flush a little, which got worse when I heard him chuckling quietly, I excused myself because I had to get to class, inviting him to tag along as per usual. That said, I headed to my first class, not noticing much of anything paranormal throughout the day except of course for sometimes feeling that sensation of being watched, as if someone were standing directly behind me, peering over my shoulder as I sat at my various desks doing my schoolwork. It didn't bother me.

That night, Inuyasha told me not to worry about Kikyou just yet, saying that he had an idea. He told me to sit tight, to focus on my studies, and that he'd do what he could to help me out. He said there was somebody he had in mind, if he could find her, that might become a third ally, but he wasn't positive yet. He had to see if he could find her, first, and then see if he could communicate with her. He asked me to cross my fingers for him, and told me not to worry that I wouldn't feel him around for a while, that he definitely hadn't left me for good and would be back as soon as he was able. Curious who he was going to try and find, but willing to trust him on it, I'd wished him good luck and went to bed that night for a blissful, nightmare-free sleep.

~o~o~o~o~o~

Early Friday evening I was in my dorm room, getting things ready to go back home again for the weekend, when there was an unexpected knock on the door. Eri was already out with the girls, enjoying her Friday night, so I knew it wasn't Ayumi or Yuka, and my mother wasn't due for another half hour or so, so feeling mildly curious but not worried I got up to answer the door.

Seeing an unfamiliar, elderly woman, I politely greeted, "Hi, may I help you?"

She had a friendly, grandmotherly smile, and she'd actually seemed relieved that I had answered the door.

"You're Kagome, right?" she asked quickly, hopefully, which caught me off guard.

Beginning to feel both mildly confused and concerned I'd answered that yes, I was Kagome, and she'd immediately sagged in relief and told me how grateful she was to have found me, introducing herself as Kaede, Kikyou's sister.

My eyes lit up in surprise.

Asking if she could come in I'd immediately and excitedly ushered her inside, admitting bluntly that I'd thought she was dead, from how her daughter Tsubaki had phrased things when we'd met. With a bitter laugh, Kaede had explained that while her daughter would like to pretend she was out of her life for good she was in fact very much alive and well, relaying that Tsubaki had merely taken over the house when she'd relented and moved into a 'community', to put it politely.

I couldn't believe it. Tsubaki had shipped her mother off to an old folks' home.

Was everyone in that family a total bitch or what?

Although, as Kaede and I talked, I'd quickly realized how super nice she actually was. She reminded me of my own grandmother. She explained to me how she'd found me, and why she had sought me out. Inuyasha had come to her in a dream the night before, she'd said, explaining that she'd immediately believed it was the real him upon waking up because of having lived with her sister's ghost for so long and knowing what it felt like to speak with one in a dream. As Kaede explained it, Inuyasha had broken everything down for her, basically sitting her down and saying 'you need to listen to me'. He'd then proceeded to tell her who I was, and how and why I was trying to help Kikyou. He'd told her about Naraku's lie, explaining that he hadn't even been _aware _of it until _I'd_ spoken with Naraku the previous Saturday, and he'd then concluded his visit by telling Kaede that we needed her help, and that together, maybe the _three _of us could finally get Kikyou to listen.

Kaede said she'd woken up with a start, and had immediately been a woman on a mission. Inuyasha had given her my location at the dorm, and the only reason she hadn't come over first thing in the morning, she'd said, was because he had actually asked her to wait until after my classes were over.

I was dumbfounded, to say the least, but I'd obviously believed her, and I was so very grateful to Inuyasha for seeking Kaede out like that, since I hadn't even known she was still alive. Apparently he'd been able to communicate with her in her dream because, as he'd explained the process to me the day before, there was an emotional connection there, between them. Kaede wasn't a stranger, and so therefore he had been able to form that mental bond needed to enter her dreams without it waking her up.

She'd corroborated my belief in that regard when she'd said how she remembered Inuyasha quite well from her childhood, back when her sister had been alive and dating him. She said she'd always liked him back then, never once having thought he was a bad person, and she'd actually felt sorry for him even, having seen how her sister had treated him at times. She remembered Naraku, too, and told me that he'd always given her the creeps. Kikyou had _not _been encouraging Naraku's flirtations, I'd learned, but neither had she tried very hard to discourage him, more or less brushing him off, and acting unconcerned when a young Kaede had told her older sister how she didn't like him.

Kaede told me that having spent most of her life with her sister's ghost she'd heard the story of her death from Kikyou's perspective numerous times, and that even after finding out what Naraku had told her she'd always had her doubts, suspecting Naraku had been lying, but unlike me, she said she'd never had the courage to actually go and ask Naraku about it. A part of her had been afraid to find out that it really was true, she'd admitted, but beyond that, she said that she hadn't figured it would really do any good to know either way. Nothing would bring Kikyou back. She'd wanted only for her sister to be at peace and move on, and she'd tried to do the same, getting married, raising a family. Acquiring their parents' house, Kaede said she had chosen to stay there, knowing that Kikyou was hanging around and not wanting to abandon her, but that for the most part she'd moved on with her own life after the first few years of failed attempts to help her sister let go and find peace. At that point, they'd simply accepted the fact that their house was haunted and that there was nothing they could do about it.

Kaede explained that, until the night before, she'd never even realized that Inuyasha's ghost was also still around, because Kikyou had never once mentioned it. Kikyou had mostly come to her in her dreams, she'd said, and Inuyasha had also previously told me that he'd stopped going to Kikyou's house long ago, to grant her that sanctuary away from him since her hatred of him had been clear, and so it stood to reason in my mind that even if Kikyou had explained the whole thing to her sister in the waking world where Inuyasha could have overheard it, he hadn't heard it because he simply hadn't been around. Explaining that part to Kaede in that moment, I'd told herhow all this time, Inuyasha had known that Kikyou blamed him for her death, but that he'd just thought the same thing everyone else on campus thought, that _she'd_ actually thought that he'd been the one to drive the blade into her heart. I was sure that Inuyasha probably would have gone to Kaede long before then to defend himself and tell her it wasn't true if he'd been aware of Naraku's lie, but Naraku had never told a single person about what he'd told Kikyou in the moment of her death until he'd told _me, _and I had that confession on video, I'd told Kaede then.

Telling me how grateful she was to me for picking up where she'd left off, for continuing what should have been her job and how she now felt like she'd turned her back on her sister and how she definitely wanted to help us help Kikyou, Kaede went on to explain that she hadn't seen her sister on a daily basis back then because she didn't have my 'gift', and so while I was obsessing because I felt such a strong connection to that world it'd been easier for her to put it out of her mind most days, most of the time her days passing by uneventfully. Just like how living in a haunted house would be for most normal people, she and her family had heard the occasional knocks or footsteps, and had found the occasional object had moved on its own, but trying to communicate with Kikyou directly, outside of her dreams, had never been very successful. There had been enough activity here and there to verify that Kikyou's ghost really was around, but a lot of the time life had gone on normally for those in the house who were actually living. Even when she'd _wanted _Kikyou to show herself and speak with her, Kaede said she usually hadn't done anything, and that when she _had, _all hell would break lose. Just like I'd come to experience, Kikyou had usually reverted to throwing a fit – and sometimes objects – whenever anybody had tried to talk to her too intently about her death, and so Kaede had quickly learned that trying to talk with her sister was unproductive and, for the most part, she'd simply given up. Kaede said her angle, when she _had_ tried it, had been to try and get Kikyou to see that it didn't really matter who was to blame for her death, and that the past was the past and she needed to just accept her fate and move on to the next stage of existence, regardless of what had or hadn't happened between Inuyasha and Naraku. Kaede said Kikyou's response had usually been a somber 'Inuyasha betrayed me', as if she hadn't heard a single thing her little sister'd said.

Having finally grown as frustrated as I was already feeling after only two weeks, Kaede said she'd given up trying to help Kikyou long ago, until the last ditch effort that had been bringing in that paranormal team, which she'd wanted to try before moving out of the house. Having them ask questions like 'What would it take for you to find peace?' or 'What do you require in order to move on?' Kaede had hoped that their more sophisticated, modern equipment would pick up an in-depth answer, but no such luck. They'd gotten a few initial responses from her, again enough to prove that her ghost was in fact around, but none of the important questions had received any answers whatsoever.

I knew what would set Kikyou free: the truth, as cliché as that sounded.

I'd started to tell Kaede my ideas, but our conversation got interrupted when there was another knock on the door, and I knew it was my mother that time. Jumping up to answer it, I'd excitedly introduced my mother to Kikyou's sister, and Mom was thrilled to realize that I might be successful in my endeavor to help Kikyou move on sooner rather than later. It'd already been two weeks, and my stupid ass had originally thought I could save her over that first weekend, but now, it at least looked like I wouldn't be plagued by Kikyou's ghost for _years, _as Kaede had been. Together, we would finally be able to get her to listen.

With Kaede excusing herself, after she and I exchanged phone numbers of course, we made quick plans to get together the next day and then I rode back home with Mom. My weekend was looking so much brighter all of a sudden.


	4. An invisible man sleeping in my bed

Blanket Disclaimer:

Inuyasha, and the characters therein, are the property of Rumiko Takahashi. I am in no way affiliated with Takahashi, or VIZ Productions.

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Chapter four: An invisible man sleeping in my bed

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Turning my space heater on as soon as I got home, I'd encouraged Inuyasha to soak up as much power as he could, asking him to save his energy for the following day and to only use our knocking code for communication if at all possible. Dinner was a peaceful affair, and then once I'd retired to my room – which was again much cooler than it should have been with the heater running – I'd bade Inuyasha goodnight. I received two knocks in reply. Grinning to myself, I left the space heater on and drifted off into a peaceful, specter-free sleep.

The following morning it was time to get our show on the road, and I was ready to go, my laptop fully charged, as I awaited Kaede's call, which hadn't been a long wait. Then I was out the door, Inuyasha and I making a return trip to where it'd all started, for me at least: the graveyard.

Kaede said Tsubaki wouldn't stand for any more 'foolishness' in what _was _technically her house, now, and she and I both knew the school was out of the question during the day, since we'd never have the privacy we needed, even on a Saturday, and so the graveyard had been our only viable option, since Kaede's daughter was such a bitch.

That was okay; I hadn't really had any desire to see her again, anyway. I'd just hoped that Kikyou wasn't going to drain my laptop's battery, but I _had _brought my car charger for it, just in case.

Meeting Kaede in the parking area, we walked together making pleasant smalltalk on our way to Kikyou's grave. I let her lead the way since I'd only been there the once, and I admittedly hadn't really been paying _that _much attention to where I was going at the time, following my friends in the dark like I'd been. It didn't take us long to find Kikyou's grave, since Kaede knew exactly where it was, and I immediately noticed that the groundskeepers had cleaned up our mess, not that I'd actually expected to see the remains of our candles and Kikyou's photograph still lying around after sixteen days. Without that lingering evidence of our séance, the area had actually seemed almost...peaceful, in a morbid kind of way, of course.

"Okay, here we go..." I said more to myself, trying to shake off my nervousness.

I immediately felt Inuyasha give my hand an encouraging squeeze. It was reminiscent of my very first physical contact with him, except it hadn't left me feeling frozen and on the verge of passing out. He had been stronger by that point, and no longer needed to tap into as much of my own energy in order to fuel himself, plus I think I'd also become more and more in-tune with him over the last couple of weeks and so it was also becoming easier for me to feel his presence without him having to exert as much effort. I had a gift, yes, but it was one that I hadn't used in roughly fourteen years, and so just like any other muscle I'd needed to exercise that special part of my psyche in order to make it stronger, as well.

Whispering a thanks under my breath for his show of encouragement, I'd told Kaede in that moment that I was ready whenever she was, and I let her get things started, then, as she nodded my way before speaking up, asking Kikyou to come forward.

"Sister, it is I, Kaede..." she began, apologizing to Kikyou for having waited so long since her last visit, which had been several years ago. "I'm sure you are here. Please, come and speak with me, please."

"_You again_..._" _I heard Kikyou say all of a sudden, her tone annoyed. _"Leave my sister alone_._"_

"She's here, Kaede." I said, after realizing Kaede must not have heard Kikyou's words since she hadn't reacted at all.

"What did she say?"

"She asked me to leave you alone."

Kaede didn't hesitate to jump right into it.

"Kikyou, Kagome is here at my request. I ask that you please allow us to speak with you." she began. "She is aware, now, aware of what Naraku told you. She knows now that she had been wrong all this time, in believing that you thought as the rumors at school say, that you died believing Inuyasha had personally been the one to kill you. She now knows the truth behind what you have told me many times, of what Naraku told _you_. She knows it is true that Naraku did tell you this, that he told you it was Inuyasha's desire for him to kill you, and that you know it was Naraku's hand that held the knife."

I saw Kikyou's ghost appear, her form slightly transparent and sitting on her headstone of all things, looking as if she were bored, or perhaps just tired.

"_Naraku told me_..._" _she said, her voice still sounding distant, not necessarily coming from the location of her image.

Kaede heard her that time, I know, because she responded.

"Yes, Naraku told you, and Kagome knows that too, now, because Naraku told her, as well."

She passed me a look, and I immediately spoke back up, meeting Kikyou's eyes since I could see her.

"I spoke with Naraku, Kikyou. After you said that Naraku told you, I went to him, since he is still alive. I'd wanted to know _what _he told you. I'd wanted him to tell me, too, to know what had _really _happened, and if the stories on campus were wrong, and I filmed it, Kikyou. I filmed Naraku and what he told me, and I would like to play it for you, if you will watch it. This isn't _me_ trying to tell you anything, Kikyou. All I want is for you to watch a movie, and to listen to what _Naraku _has to say."

She glared at me, but didn't otherwise respond, and Kaede looked my way with the silent question in her eyes, since she had only heard Kikyou's voice the once and couldn't see her apparition. I told Kaede in that moment that Kikyou hadn't said yes or no, but that she was still with us, and so I was going to go for it, as I took my laptop out of my bag and fired it up, silently praying that Kikyou actually _would _watch the video.

To keep Kikyou distracted and/or mollified while my computer booted up, Kaede immediately began speaking to her again, telling her sister how much she loved and missed her. I noticed Kikyou's eyes soften at Kaede's words, her scowl disappearing as her form became a tad bit more solid looking, and I was grateful for the fact that, bitchy girlfriend or no, Kikyou apparently loved her sister.

Getting my video program open and pressing play on the desired file, I sat my laptop down on the grass facing Kikyou's headstone and backed away a few paces, letting it be more of a Kikyou and Kaede moment. Since Kaede hadn't seen the video either her curiosity soon got the better of her, as she moved herself into position to watch the footage as well, and it was a fascinating experience for me from my place observing off to the side, as I watched both sisters' reactions as Naraku's tale unfolded. By the time the recording got to the part where Naraku was speaking to Kikyou directly, apologizing for all that he'd done, Kikyou's spirit had moved away from her headstone and was standing directly beside Kaede, although whether the elderly woman was aware of her sister's presence beside her I wasn't sure.

Then Naraku began apologizing to Inuyasha, and Kikyou looked away from the video, peering over in my direction, but with apologetic eyes for the first time instead of the nasty glare she'd always previously given me. Her eyes met mine for a brief moment, then her gaze shifted off to the side slightly. Sensing his presence at the same time, I glanced beside myself and watched, unsurprised, as Inuyasha's ghost slowly materialized, his eyes full of sorrow, but also joy and relief, as he and Kikyou spoke silently back and forth through their locked gaze.

Kaede continued watching the video until it ended, and then as if snapping out of a trance, she wiped a few stray tears out of her eyes and did her best to mask her emotional state by joking that she was an old woman who didn't understand computers, as she picked up my laptop and handed it to me as I approached. Shutting it down, I closed it and put it back away in my bag, all the while silently wondering what was going on between Inuyasha and Kikyou, since both of their ghosts had disappeared by that point. I'd been hoping that he wasn't going to just up and leave without saying goodbye, although I'd been happy for him either way, that Kikyou was no longer angry with him for something he hadn't done. I'd felt a weird knot in my chest at the prospect of never seeing him again, but arguing with myself that I'd known going in that my goal was to help both Kikyou _and _Inuyasha find peace and move on, his peace stemming from Kikyou finding peace, I'd congratulated myself on a job well done and had silently wished him the best.

Filling Kaede in on what all I'd witnessed with their apparitions, she'd started crying again, obvious tears of joy, as she thanked me for everything I'd done for her and her sister, and Inuyasha of course, stating that she fully believed that I had been sent to them, like I was some sort of an angel or something, and that finally, _finally_, it seemed clear that Kikyou's misery and suffering had come to an end. Saying our goodbyes once we reached our cars in the parking lot, Kaede vowed to stay in touch, and saying I'd like that, a lot, I then watched as she got in her car and drove away before finally snapping out of it and getting in my mom's car for my own trip back home.

The drive back home had been silent, since I hadn't had anybody to talk to and I'd decided to leave the stereo off, as I'd quietly contemplated everything that'd happened and everything Kaede'd said. Maybe I _had _been sent to them, and my gift had to have come from somewhere, right? Obviously, there was life after death, so it'd be pretty foolish to not believe in some kind of divine higher order, I'd decided then. If this really were my calling, then I probably wasn't supposed to stop with just Kikyou and Inuyasha, either, I knew, but I'd decided in that moment to take my destiny one step at a time, or one ghost at a time, whatever the case may be. I wasn't feeling confident enough yet to go bursting into known haunted locations going _behold, ghosts, I am here to save you, _but if another lost soul just _happened _to find its way to me, well...I'd cross that spiritual bridge when I came to it, I'd decided then.

Coming back home, I gave Souta and Mom the good news. I explained how I didn't know anything for certain, yet, as far as whether Kikyou's soul was still tethered to the Earth or if she'd been able to ascend to some higher plane, but at the very least I had felt confident that her misery and self-torment was over. Her misguided hatred towards Inuyasha was over. If that'd really been all that was keeping her here, then I'd imagined that she'd be moving on, be that to Heaven or just some other dimension, I wasn't sure and wasn't going to question. It didn't really matter, I'd figured, if you wanted to look at things from a more religious angle or a scientific one. I figured _some _questions I'd never know the answers to, until it was _my _turn. In the meantime, my game plan from that moment onward had been to just continue with my schooling as normal, I'd told them, saying that whatever would or wouldn't happen in the future, we'd find out when the time came.

My mother had told me again how proud she was of me, and then we let the subject go, and I kicked back at home, or at least tried to, watching a couple of movies with Souta and just generally trying to keep my mind occupied.

Getting in the shower before bed, all of my pent up emotions started coming out, but trying not to cry, and actually getting angry with myself for feeling so selfish when I knew I _should _just be happy for Inuyasha and not miss him as much as I did, I'd sucked it up and went to bed with a false bravado. Reciting silently in my head that e-mail forward that'd been going around for years about people coming into your life for a reason, a season or a lifetime, I'd felt that in this case that they – he – had come into my life for a reason, and with his purpose fulfilled it was time for the both of us to move on to our separate destinies.

It was no wonder, with thoughts of Inuyasha plaguing my head, that I'd wound up dreaming about him that night. The dream had been random, just glimpses of moments of he and I talking, and it hadn't followed any logic. Waking up early the next morning, I'd immediately known that it had only been a dream, that it hadn't been the real Inuyasha come to say goodbye.

It'd taken me a couple of minutes to realize how freakin' _cold _it was in my room, as I huddled underneath my blankets and actually glanced at my window to make sure it hadn't accidentally been left open or something. I'd neglected to turn the space heater on the night before, I'd realized in that moment, but even so, it should _not _have been _that _cold. Not with central heat in the house, which I could hear running.

"Inuyasha, are you here?" I asked, trying not to sound _too _hopeful.

I immediately received two knocks.

Unable to mask my relief, I jumped out of bed and immediately clicked on the space heater.

"Sorry I forgot to turn this on last night." I said, before reaching in my closet for the big fluffy bathrobe I almost never wore, wrapping it around my pajama-clad form.

Inuyasha's image appeared before me then, looking solid, like a real person. His eyes were concerned.

"Were you worried I had left...for good?" he asked.

"I...I wasn't _worried_...but I had wondered if you'd moved on, yeah." I admitted.

"Without saying goodbye?" he asked, his tone incredulous. "I thought you knew me better than that."

I would have apologized for my lack of faith in him, for possibly hurting his feelings, even, but before I could say anything his eyes adopted a teasing sparkle, his lips curling up in a mirthful grin.

"You missed me." he said, chuckling, and forgetting myself, I threw my pillow at him, which passed right through his suddenly translucent body and knocked over my desk lamp, causing him to laugh even harder.

His image completely faded away, then, and I cried out with a panicked "Wait!" before I could stop myself; it'd been an instinctive reaction.

I stopped cold, both figuratively and literally, when the air around me dropped in temperature by at least ten degrees, as I felt a hand on the back of my neck pull my hair back away from my ear, and then he whispered, _"I'm not going anywhere_._" _

I felt shivers travel down my spine.

"You know, you can be a real jerk when you want to be." I said. He laughed again.

"So..." I said then, changing the subject. "How's Kikyou?"

"_At peace_._" _

His voice was quiet and seemed to come from all around me that time, instead of a whisper directly in my ear. I sagged in relief at what he'd said.

"Good...that's good. I'm so glad to hear that." I replied honestly.

"_Thank you_..._for everything_._"_

"It was my pleasure, and I suspect my sacred duty. I'm so very glad I was able to help."

"_She said to thank you for her, too, for being as stubborn as her and not giving up_._" _

I smiled at that.

"So, has she transcended up into some version of Heaven, or is she still here on Earth as a ghost but just no longer angry?"

"_Yes_._" _

Putting my left hand on my hip and shaking my right index finger in the air, I scolded, "You're doing that vague ghostly thing again."

He immediately retorted with, _"You're doing that black and white thing again_._" _

Fair enough. So Kikyou had both transcended and was still on Earth as a happy ghost, at the same time. Remembering how Inuyasha had already told me that he _could_ 'move on', if he _wanted_ to, and that he had chosen to stay because Kikyou had been trapped, I'd hypothesized in that moment that a ghost whose spirit was at peace, a 'happy' soul, could perhaps come and go as they pleased – hence the occasional story you might hear of somebody seeing the ghost of a loved one only once, and years after they'd died, to give them some kind of a message. It was only miserable, tormented souls who could not enter that higher plane of existence, who were tethered to Earth 24/7 by their own suffering, but if you were at peace and _did _'move on', it wasn't necessarily a one-way trip.

I'd voiced my hypothesis aloud, and smiled triumphantly when he'd replied with another 'yes'.

Deciding to change the subject again in that moment, I'd told him we'd talk more later but that I was hungry, and grabbing some clothes I headed into the bathroom to do my business and get dressed before heading downstairs for breakfast.

~o~o~o~o~o~

Life became a bit of a blur after that day. Without the heavy burden that was my obsession to help Kikyou weighing me down, I'd been free to concentrate fully on my studies again, and days quickly turned into weeks. I'd even spent a couple of weekends hanging out and having fun with the girls instead of coming back home, although I was still coming home _most _weekends, so that Inuyasha and I could hang out, instead. I hadn't asked him _why _he'd decided to stick around, mostly because I hadn't wanted to jinx it, but I'd definitely been grateful for his decision to stay rather than move on himself now that Kikyou had. I'd supposed that just like any normal twenty-year-old who'd just spent the last fifty years alone and suddenly had a new best friend, if there _were _such a thing as a 'normal' person matching that absurd description, he'd just wanted to have friends, to feel like he was a part of something again; he'd wanted to _belong_.

I never questioned why he hadn't wanted to 'move on' _with _Kikyou, since he'd already told me that he had fallen out of love with her long before their deaths, and although he'd never said, I'd supposed it made sense that even if Kikyou had never known that particular detail she'd probably still figured that he'd stopped loving her at some point over the last fifty years of her hating him and falsely blaming him for her death, and so why he had stayed behind had not been a mystery to her. Whatever he had or hadn't told her, she'd moved on, which was obviously the most important thing, so the little details didn't matter. As far as anybody else that Inuyasha might've wanted to see in that other plane was concerned, namely his parents since he'd already told me he'd never really had any friends growing up, since I'd more or less cracked the code that 'happy ghosts' could come and go as they pleased instead of the infamous 'light' or 'door' as a one-way portal showing up to whisk them away as some TV shows have portrayed, I'd figured that he'd probably gone and spoken with his deceased parents long ago, when they'd originally passed on, and so there was no unfinished business there, with them having died but never getting to be reunited with their murdered son. I was _sure _he'd gone to them to at least let them know he was all right, coming back to Earth afterwards as he'd felt was his duty at the time. But responsibility to Kikyou or no, what twenty-year-old guy would want to spend _eternity_ with his _parents?_ So it was no wonder why he was still hanging around, when you really thought about it. Hell, if I were in his metaphorical shoes, I'd probably tell my dead relatives a quick 'hi' and 'bye' and then spend my afterlife on Earth hanging out with living people who could see and hear me, too.

In fact, as funny as it sounded, since most kids thought about what they wanted to do when they grew up, I'd decided by that point that I knew what I wanted to do when I _died_. I want to stay on Earth as a peaceful ghost and continue to help other people. Call it an angel, call it an earthbound spirit, but I was put here to help people, I know that now, and I love helping and interacting with others way too much to flutter off into some great universal whatever upon my death when there would still be people on Earth in need of my help.

I'd cross _that _spiritual bridge when I came to it.

Bringing it up with Souta one movie night, he'd jokingly told me that he wanted to stay on Earth as a ghost, too, but as a practical joker, showing up at parties to perform 'stupid ghost tricks' and spook the living people. We'd immediately heard a crash from upstairs as he'd said it, and upon investigating we'd seen that another one of Souta's board games had 'mysteriously' fallen to the floor, that time Scrabble, and spelled out in the spilled blocks it said _'You mean like this?' _

He'd even formed a question mark from upside down, blank tiles.

Souta had excitedly cried out, "I love having a ghost! Thank you for haunting us, Inuyasha!"

I'd heard Inuyasha's chuckle in response, but my brother hadn't, as he ushered me back downstairs to get back to our movie, saying he'd clean up his fallen game later. Our movie? Ghost Busters.

I know...I was turning into a total paranormal geek. Did I care? Not in the slightest.

The days continued to tick by, the official start of winter getting closer and closer, although the steady drop in temperature didn't fazed me one bit since I'd been spending most days wrapped up in my own little pocket of chilly air for over a month now. I'd taken to wearing sweaters and dealing with it, adjusting to the cooler temperatures the same as I imagined somebody who'd moved to Alaska had to learn to adjust. The cold air around me meant that _Inuyasha _was around me, and it was a metaphorically warm and fuzzy feeling, despite the chill.

He frequently came to me in my sleep, too, which was a reprieve from the cold, although as predicted if I somehow realized it was a dream I almost invariably woke up not long after. Even so, it was an enjoyable experience to awaken from such a dream and know that for one brief moment, I'd _known_. I'd always been mildly envious of people who could have lucid dreams on a regular basis. I told myself to have faith that, like Inuyasha had said, practice would make perfect and I'd eventually master the skill, too, like how I'd already been learning to master my gift. In the meantime, he would sometimes allow me to remain blissfully unaware so that our time together in the dream could last, and although not lucid those dreams were still very vivid and memorable for me upon waking. We went to the beach, once, and another time we were even at Disneyland. I'd made a joke that he could haunt the Haunted Mansion and become the one-thousandth ghost, which I'd thought was incredibly funny at the time until, thanks to my joke, it dawned on me that he really _was _a ghost, and then our time at the Magic Kingdom came to an abrupt end when I woke up.

Oops.

Oh well.

Inuyasha had also turned into somewhat of a practical joker, something I blamed my little brother for entirely. Several times in class I'd reach for my pen or pencil only to watch it start to roll away from me and off the desk before I could grab it. Or I'd feel little annoying tugs in my hair non-stop all throughout an important lecture. Once, I'd actually dreamt that it was high school, and he was holding my locker closed, and no matter how hard I tried I couldn't open it. He'd been standing right beside be, leaning casually against the lockers with his hand pressed flatly against mine, other students walking right through him as if he weren't even there, and when I'd begged him to let me get inside my locker he'd told me to say 'pretty please'. When I'd woken up I'd grumbled, pissed off, that that had better _not _have really been him in _that_ dream, and he hadn't replied.

Bastard.

But I couldn't stay mad at him, and I couldn't even pretend that I was. I'd grown to care for him far too much by that point. He was becoming more than just a friend to me, despite myself, which was a personal problem I knew I'd have to deal with, but inappropriate attractions notwithstanding, he was my very best friend by that point, far more so than Eri, Yuka and Ayumi. Sure, I still hung out with them, and it was definitely fun having friends I could speak with in public without having to pretend to be on the phone, but they just didn't _get me _the same way he did. I'd realized somewhere along the way that I felt a kind of kinship with Inuyasha that I'd never felt with another person before in my life. Certainly not with either of my 'boyfriends' back in high school. We might've been from two completely different generations, but Inuyasha and I were kindred spirits.

It was just too bad that...

No, I hadn't ever let myself complete that thought. What good would it have done?

Sooooo, with the calendar ticking away, Christmas Day growing closer and closer, it was the Friday before Christmas before I knew it, and I was once again home for the weekend. When I'd first sat down to dinner with my family that night I'd had _no _idea that my life was about to change, in a good way, forever.

Dinner conversation had been filled with the usual pleasantries, at first, as my mother and grandfather took turns asking me about my schooling and grades, while Souta dropped a few subtle questions about my 'friends' so that I could tell him that yes, Inuyasha and I were still in touch the same as usual, with it sounding only like we were talking about my doormmates. Then Grandpa asked me what my plans were for Christmas Eve, and I'd said that of course I would come back home on Tuesday to spend that night with all of them since there was obviously no school on Christmas Day; I'd said I was looking forward to it.

The old man _really _surprised me, then, when out of left field he asked me with a merry twinkle in his eye if there might be somebody _else _I'd _rather_ spend the holiday with.

Nudge, nudge, wink, wink, know what I mean?

Okay, obviously he didn't say _that _part, but that was how the question'd felt, and from my own grandfather, no less. Apparently, my 'secret code' with Souta for discussing Inuyasha had been more transparent than I'd thought, and so now he thought I had a boyfriend I hadn't wanted to talk about. I'd had no idea how to go about telling my grandfather just how wrong he was, and how while I _did _kind of, sort of, have a 'friend who was a boy', that he most definitely was _not _my 'boyfriend'. He wasn't even _alive_, although I'd figured I'd skip _that _part and just try to explain how I was _not _in a secret relationship I hadn't told them about.

Of course, the thought of Inuyasha _not _being my boyfriend had caused a nasty little ache to appear in my chest in that moment, which I'd quickly stamped down, of course, masking my momentary discomfort at his innuendo – or at least trying to – by taking a long sip of my iced tea, which I'd followed up by laughing as if I'd found his comment amusingly absurd.

"Nope. Nobody I'd rather spend the holiday with." I answered. I'd hoped that that'd be the end of it, but no such luck.

"Bah, in my day, a young woman your age didn't spend Christmas Eve with her parents." he said, but in a light, teasing tone. "In Japan, Christmas Eve is a more romantic holiday than Valentine's Day for young couples in love."

"Oh Father, really..." my mom said, trying to come to my rescue, and I laughed again despite myself, my amusement more genuine that time. I just couldn't believe my grandpa was trying to hint that I should be spending the night with a boy. My _grandpa! _

I mean, I wasn't a virgin, but even so, to have my grandfather pushing the whole 'when are you going to have a boyfriend' bit was a little cliché. I understood, though. I'm a career-minded girl, and 'back in his day' young girls my age were trying to get husbands rather than Ph.D.s.

"Jii-chan..." I addressed him in Japanese, which I knew he preferred, "Honestly, if I had somebody else I could spend the holiday with, I would still come home and spend it with you guys, just bringing my _guest _along with me, _if_ I had one. I'm not hiding anybody from you."

Okay, so that last part hadn't exactly been true, but it _had _been true in the context he'd taken it as, at least. I most definitely did not have any secret boyfriends I hadn't wanted to bring home yet. I'd introduce him to the friend I'd actually already been bringing home for the last month and a half, but I hadn't wanted to give my poor ol' grandfather a heart attack. Especially since, although she'd never told me, I'd suspected my mother's original disbelief in ghosts had had something to do with how she'd been raised. If Grandpa was an adamant non-believer then the _last _thing I'd wanted to do at his age was flush all his truths down the toilet. I'd figured that he and I could talk about it after he passed away, as weird of a concept as that sounded.

Apparently deciding to let it go, thank goodness, Gramps just got back to eating after that, shooting me the occasional playful, knowing look, but otherwise not bringing the subject back up again. If he hadn't believed me, he at least wasn't going to keep hounding me about it, and for that, I'd definitely been grateful.

Finishing dinner, I excused myself up to my room, and Souta followed me, my brother having finished his meal as well.

"If only he knew who your boyfriend _really _was." he murmured quietly with a laugh as soon as we were upstairs.

"Et tu, Brute?" I replied sarcastically. Before he could respond I kept going.

"Souta, Inuyasha is my _friend_, yes, but not my _boyfriend_. Sheesh, the guy's a ghost, give me _some _credit. Why would I want to go and emotionally involve myself with somebody I can never actually have a relationship with? That'd make me pretty stupid, huh?"

In response, he gave me that look again, like he didn't believe me; the same look he'd given me back when he hadn't bought the lie that I'd been talking to Eri on the phone. It really pissed me off that he could read me so easily. Sure, I knew I cared for Inuyasha, but I also knew how stupid it was that I'd developed feelings for him. That part was true, at least.

"You can't help who you fall in love with, Sis, and it's nothing to belittle yourself over. What good do you think it does to deny your feelings? That won't help you to deal with them." he replied then, sounding like _he _should be the one studying to become a therapist.

Blushing, I yanked Souta into my room before Mom or Grandpa overheard us, and then hissed "Okay, I might have a _crush _on him, but I'm not in love with him. Give me a break."

Even as I said it, I knew the tone of my voice and the look in my eyes had betrayed me.

Longing, hopelessness...

_I_..._I love Inuyasha_...

My brother's eyes were sympathetic, his tone caring.

"Maybe he feels the same way." he supplied, and I snorted.

"I don't doubt that he cares for me, we're friends, but I don't think ghosts even work that way. I mean sure, Dad's spirit was probably still in love with Mom, sort of, but I think it's more of a pure kind of love when you're a ghost, you know? The emotional connection; that part is still there. The longing you feel in your heart to be with that person, as-in be in their presence, to simply be _around _them, that part's still there. But there's a whole _other _side to when two _living _human beings are in love, Souta, and it does me _no _good to waste time entertaining _those _kinds of fantasies."

"You never know what might-" he started.

I'd interrupted him.

"Oh yeah, maybe I can masturbate while he talks dirty to me." I replied sarcastically. "Or better yet, maybe I'll die in a car accident so that he and I can go off and share eternity together."

I didn't like how gruesomely appealing a minute part of myself had found that second scenario. I was not, and _am _not, suicidal. Souta seemed to understand that I hadn't meant it seriously, though, and he politely chose not to comment on my first scenario.

"Well, whatever does or doesn't end up happening between you two, just know that _I _think that true love can transcend all obstacles."

"That's truly inspirational," I told him, not really sarcastically since I _had _thought that it was downright awesome of him to be defending my emotions like he'd been doing, "but I'm pretty sure I can guarantee you that my feelings are one-sided, so I'm just gonna have to settle for true friendship transcending all obstacles."

It was still super awesome being best friends with a ghost, after all.

It was just too bad that, for some obscure reason, the fact that my ghost friend was almost certainly in the same room as us while we had that conversation had momentarily slipped my mind. Inuyasha reminded the both of us of his presence in that moment when we heard the sudden click of a pull chain as my ceiling fan came to life. Both Souta and I jumped, startled, and then I felt my face flame  
with humiliation as I realized he'd undoubtedly heard every word we'd said.

In that moment I'd actually felt torn with multiple reactions. A part of me was pissed that he'd been eavesdropping, but then the rational side of me had also known that he probably hadn't been able to help it, or that even if he could have left to give Souta and I some privacy he probably hadn't realized what we were discussing until it was too late. And then what warm blooded man, deceased or otherwise, wouldn't want to listen in to a woman's confession of love, right? I was sure he'd felt flattered, and was going to let me down gently. I didn't need his pity; I didn't need him to tell me all of the various reasons why it wouldn't, _couldn't_ work between us. I already knew. I'd always known.

God...I'd loved him for so long.

"I...uh...I'll leave you two alone...to work things out." Souta said then, quickly excusing himself as he rushed back downstairs. Coward.

Rubbing the palm of my right hand down my face and exhaling slowly, trying to blink back the sting of tears, I said sardonically to my empty room, "Thanks for reminding me of your presence before I made an even bigger fool of myself than I already have."

His apparition formed, full-bodied and opaque, in the back of my room, by the window, and in that moment I found myself wishing, only for a split second, that I didn't have my gift. I wouldn't have seen him then, or maybe I'd have seen the quick blur of a shadow person, but that would've been it. I didn't regret my gift, though. How could I? It's what allowed Inuyasha and I to become friends, and I wouldn't have traded our friendship for anything. I was glad I had the ability to see him; I just hadn't wanted to see him right in that very moment in time.

He opened his mouth, about to say something, but I raised my hand to cut him off and spoke first.

"Please, spare me whatever gentle let downs you're going to give. I _know _it can't work. I _know _I'm an idiot for letting my heart rule over my head. And I _know _I'm just going to have to get over it. I don't want to lose you as a friend, I really don't, so let's just pretend we've already had the heart-wrenching 'I love you as a friend' speech and move on, all right?"

The look in his eyes, I hadn't quite been able to decipher the emotions running through him, but the fact that he'd been deep in thought was obvious. He seemed to feel sorry for me, which I'd anticipated, but there had also been a determination shinning in the depths of his chocolate orbs that I hadn't understood.

"Kagome..." he said then, and damn, just hearing the sound of my name on his lips made my heart flutter.

I felt my eyes tearing up again.

"I...I need to be alone right now." I said as I grabbed some clean underwear and pajamas and ran out to the hall bathroom.

I'm not exactly sure why I'd felt the need to take a shower all of a sudden, but hot water had always been soothing for me, and maybe it was because the water running down my face would mask the feel of my tears. Maybe it was because underneath the sound of the shower stream my family wouldn't hear my sobs. The bathroom had become my sanctuary since I was never alone in my bedroom anymore, and I most definitely had _not _wanted to request that Inuyasha leave me completely in that moment. What if he never came back? So he could stay, I'd _wanted _him to stay, and I'd had every intention of rejoining him in my bedroom more level headed in twenty minutes or so. I'd just needed a moment alone to collect myself first.

The actual act of showering only took me a couple of minutes, as I scrubbed myself down on auto-pilot, and then I'd just stood there, letting the water cascade over me, washing away my pain and humiliation. Standing under the hot water longer than I normally ever would have, I pulled all of my hair down over my left shoulder and leaned forward, head down, hands on the tile, just letting the water run over my naked body as I tried not to cry. I needed to get it together.

I nearly shrieked when I suddenly felt an unexpected, open-mouthed kiss on my right shoulder, as if from someone standing directly behind me. It was passionate. It was personal. It was..._hot_. Whirling around, there was of course nobody there, but I knew better.

"Inuyasha, what-?"

I felt a fingertip touch my lips, heard _"Shhhhh_..._" _whispered in my ear, and it was so intimate a gesture my knees felt weak and I had to reach up and grab the curtain rod with my right hand to keep my balance.

Then I felt a left hand firmly cup my right breast, and it _wasn't _my own, although the thought briefly flashed through my mind that I could reach down between my legs, and how deliciously naughty it'd be, but I was still an emotional train wreck and did _not _need such random, perverted thoughts complicating my confusion in that moment. Was he actually coming on to me?

Well, actually, he was being a bit more forward than that, but under the circumstances I wasn't going to complain. If _he'd _reached down between my legs in that moment, I wouldn't have tried to stop him.

Not that I probably could have, even if I'd wanted to.

Actually, I was entirely at his mercy, and as that realization dawned on me I became even more excited.

The sensation of the hand left me, but before I could decide if I was relieved or disappointed I felt a gentle kiss on my lips, and then I heard him whisper, _"You're not stupid_._"_

I was dumbfounded.

"Inuyasha, you..." He hadn't interrupted me that time, but I let my words trail off, anyway, my unfinished question coming off loud and clear.

"_Yes, Kagome,"_ he replied, _"I love you, too_._"_

His image started to appear before me, then, and even though the logical part of my mind knew that he'd _obviously _already been able to see me even when he'd been invisible, or more accurately when he had been 'everywhere' and not yet fully concentrated into a single location, seeing a man suddenly standing in the shower with me had still had me instinctively making a grab for the shower curtain to cover myself.

"Get _out_..." I hissed, my cheeks aflame, and disappearing, I _swear _I'd seen the sparkle of his eyes and grinning teeth last for a fraction of a second longer than the rest of him, like a Cheshire cat.

Then I heard the sound of his chuckle, my only warning, before the shower curtain was suddenly yanked out of my hand and I felt two hands firmly cupping the sides of my face, a pair of lips pressed passionately against my own. I almost allowed myself to melt into the intimacy of the moment, but then the air in the shower turned icy all of a sudden, and with goosebumps erupting on my body I pulled myself out of his hold so that I could go back under the hot water, cranking up the heat as I shivered.

"_Fuck_..._" _I heard him grumble, his voice more disembodied now, and I couldn't help but chuckle at the natural, human reaction. As if a ghost could suffer from blue balls. I snorted in amusement.

"Sorry, I can normally stand the cold, but not when I'm naked and wet!" I apologized sincerely but with a chuckle, and not wanting to be a total mood kill, because I had _definitely _liked what he'd been doing, I added brazenly, "Let me just get it nice and steamy in here, and then we can continue."

"_Or you could go to sleep_._"_ he said then, and as realization dawned on what he was probably suggesting I felt my cheeks heat up again.

Or maybe it'd just been the steamy bathroom making me flush.

"O-okay..." I replied, uncertain, as I turned off the water and stepped out of the shower.

The mirror was fogged up, and then, right before my eyes, the words 'I always peaked' appeared on the glass.

Squeaking, I toweled off and got dressed in record time, his amused chuckling causing my cheeks to darken even further. Glancing back at the mirror once I was dressed, those words were actually gone and in their place it said 'You're beautiful' and whatever questions I'd had, whatever uncertainties had still remained, had disappeared as quickly as the words on the mirror, as the glass cleared, and with it, my mind.

Doing as instructed, I went to bed, intent on going to sleep, which I'd quickly found out was easier said than done with so many thoughts running rampant in my mind despite my newfound clarity. With my mind racing, my heart pounding in my chest, and the both of them playing games with me and waring with each _other_ over what was right and wrong, or what even made _sense _anymore, I tried, and failed, to find solace in unconsciousness. Blissful sleep wouldn't come for what seemed like hours, as I'd lied there, wide awake, unable to shake the feeling of not being alone, of _knowing _that there was somebody else in the room with me, watching me, _waiting _for me to fall asleep. His presence wasn't as comforting, all of a sudden, seeing as he was the cause of my sudden anxiety. It wasn't that I _didn't _want him there, but suddenly, instead of him just being my resident ghost friend, he was...becoming something more, and I was a girl who'd never had much past success with that _something more _and so I'd felt like I was rapidly approaching uncharted territory. Realizing and learning how to deal with the fact that I'd been born with the supernatural ability to communicate with the dead had been a cakewalk compared to the nervousness I'd felt in that moment, as I'd realized that not only did I have feelings for Inuyasha, but he had feelings for me in return.

Here I'd been scolding myself in private for the last month for falling for a dead guy, thinking about what an _idiot _it'd made me and how the girls at school would tease that it meant I desperately needed to get laid, and how they could _never find out _about my foolishness for that very reason, and then he'd gone and revealed that _he'd _developed feelings for _me_, as well. I hadn't known whether to laugh or cry, or both. I think I'd been in shock. And as I'd lied there I'd started to wonder when it'd happened, when he'd fallen for me. Lying there in that moment, I knew that since I _hadn't _told my girlfriends about my developing emotions for him that it had to mean that Inuyasha hadn't known how I'd felt until I'd gone and outed myself that night with Souta's help, and figuring that if he'd actually had feelings for me for even half as long as I'd had them for him, I'd realized in that moment that it was no wonder why he had come off so aggressively all of a sudden. He'd probably felt as relieved as I was quickly beginning to feel, as _happy _as I was beginning to feel, and so knowing that I was putting myself down for my feelings because I'd thought them one-sided, he'd done what he'd done to make damn sure I knew that he did indeed feel the same way. I had to hand it to the guy; direct and to the point was such a wonderful way to work things out. Screw subtitles.

Eventually, sleep claimed me. It was inevitable, after all. I'd welcomed the sensation.

Opening my eyes, or so I'd thought, the air in my room had had an unusual stillness to it, the light set at a peculiar, romantic glow, like from candles, except there were none. It hadn't dawned on me that the light in my ceiling fan couldn't be dimmed. Dressed still in the pajamas I had worn to bed, I hadn't realized at first that I was dreaming. I'd thought, as most people do when they 'wake up' in their dream, that I was in fact awake, believing it the next morning. My mind immediately took me back to what I perceived as the night before, of the moment when I'd realized that Inuyasha shared my feelings, of what had happened in the shower, and I'd felt my pulse quicken as my cheeks heated up, wondering if he was still with me, there, in my room. As if summoned by my thoughts, it was in that moment that I saw a shadow move out of the corner of my eye, and turning my head to focus, instead of disappearing, like a shadow person would for most people, I saw him standing there, watching me. He was dressed in his Halloween costume, as was always the case, but this time the mask was included; an unexpected bonus, which I'd found both mysterious and sexy.

Climbing out of bed, I'd approached him slowly, and he'd remained still and speechless. Standing directly before him, I'd reached up with both hands as if in a trance to untie his mask, pulling it away from his handsome face.

Check that. His absolutely _gorgeous _face.

"Much better." I said, and then looking down over his entire form appreciatively, it only took me a couple of seconds to realize he was no longer wearing his old time-y suit but was instead in a normal pair of jeans and a t-shirt, barefoot.

"I agree, this _is _much better." he'd stated then, and I got the distinct impression that he'd always been a jeans and a t-shirt kind of guy. One more thing we had in common.

"Wait...you can change clothes?" I'd asked, surprised. "Why haven't you ever done that before?"

"You noticed?" he'd questioned back. "I'm glad."

I puzzled over his obscure reply, until one possible explanation presented itself above all others.

"Is this...really happening?" I'd asked him then, my voice hesitant, unsure.

"Does it matter?" he'd answered, the cryptic quality of his response giving me the answer I needed.

"This is a dream, isn't it?" I asked then, even though I already knew it was.

Smiling, he had replied honestly with, "Yes, Kagome, this is a dream, but _I'm_ real, _believe_ me."

"I do..." I replied, and I'd meant it.

"Are you ready to continue where we left off?" he asked me then.

"I am." I answered, and I'd meant it.

The smile never left his lips as he reached his right hand up to gently cup the back of my head, and as he slowly closed the gap between us, his eyes drifting shut, I found my own eyes closing as well, welcoming the sensation of his lips against my own, as slowly our kiss deepened, the hand on the back of my head tightening into a fist, gripping my hair firmly in his passion as fire ignited between us. My own hands did not stay idle, as I consciously pleaded with myself to stay asleep, to allow myself this moment. Wrapping both of my hands up and around his neck, I gently tugged to urge him to follow me, as I began walking backwards, and reaching my bed I tugged again to make him follow me still as I lied back down against my bedding, bringing him down with me in my refusal to let go. He did not put up a fight, eagerly complying, as he shifted his position to lie stretched out atop me, both of his legs in between my own, his hands cupping the sides of my face as mine fisted his hair, our tongues never ceasing in their battle for dominance against one another.

We stayed like that for I don't know how long, kissing, touching, my hands creeping their way up and underneath his shirt to feel the hot, lean muscles of his back. His left hand snaked underneath my pajama top to again cup my bare right breast, squeezing gently, and I responded by lightly scratching my nails down his back.

Moaning into our kiss, which had almost sounded like a growl in his passion, he broke his lips away from my own but only so that he could slam them against the left side of my neck, as he bit and sucked the junction where my neck met my shoulder, soothing the sting with a gentle blowing of cool air before trailing his tongue up and down the entire side of my throat. That went on for at least a couple of minutes before he'd abruptly stopped and backed away from me, sitting up on his knees.

Clearly having decided that my pajama top was a hindrance, he reached for its bottom edge in that moment and tugged, making his intentions clear, and immediately complying, I sat myself up away from the bedding a little and raised my arms, allowing him to pull my pajama top off. Fair was fair, though, and so once he'd rendered me topless I'd immediately made a grab for the bottom hem of his shirt, as well, before he could lie back down on top of me again, and it was then his turn to silently comply as I pulled his shirt up and over his head. Adopting a wicked smile once his chest was bared, he'd reclaimed my lips with his own, then, pushing me back down to the bed below.

His tongue relinquished the battle with mine before very long, again finding its way back over to the left side of my throat, even going up into my ear; a teasing tickle that had caused me to squirm. Then trailing his tongue lower, he bathed my exposed breasts, one and then the other, their peaks hardening under his talented ministrations. Arching my back, I'd moaned shamelessly, encouraging him to keep going, which he did.

Eventually rejoining my mouth with his own, my only thought had been that I would never, could never tire of kissing him, as I again fisted both of my hands in his long, midnight tresses. Feeling my body heat up with the weight of his own holding me down, it was in stark contrast to the freezing cold I was used to experiencing whenever he and I touched. Knowing it was a dream didn't hinder my enjoyment of the moment as I ran my hands over his heated flesh once again, as I felt the rhythm of his heart beat in time with my own, our bare chests pressed together skin on skin as he lied possessively on top of me. His hands began to explore my curves, then, tracing my hips, his left hand rubbing my right thigh appreciatively as I lifted my leg to hook it up and around his own. He rubbed his excitement against my center, his grinding making me excited as well, and then apparently deciding that my pants had to go his hand left my thigh to snake in between our bodies, reaching for the pull string of my pajama bottoms. I shifted my hips to grant him better access, my breath catching in my throat as I felt him slowly, sensually pull loose the bow, tugging gently on the waistband until it slackened.

Keeping things fair once again, I decided it was my turn, then, as I reached in between our bodies with my right hand to unfasten his jeans. Teasing him, I reached inside his denim once I opened the fly, gripping the evidence of his desire through the thin cotton he wore underneath. Hissing in pleasure, he once again buried his face in the crook of my neck, licking, sucking and biting the left side of my throat where it met my shoulder. Every time I squeezed harder, his teeth responded in kind, and it sent delightful shivers down my spine. I could only imagine the sensations traveling through his own body, but I had my suspicions as he began rocking gently back and forth in my hand. When his own hand found its way between my legs to return the favor I knew the rest of our clothing had to go.

Releasing him to reach for the waistband of my own bottoms, he immediately realized what I was doing and lifted enough of his weight off of me to allow me the freedom of movement I needed to complete the task. He took the moment of opportunity to devoid himself of his own final coverings as well, and with both of our pants and undergarments simultaneously discarded we rejoined, then, his body lying fully over my own, flesh on flesh, not yet one in body but already feeling one in mind and soul.

"I love you." I said then, softly breaking the silence that had developed between us.

He met my eyes, the look in his own sincere, passionate, as he responded with, "I love you, too. More than I've ever loved _anyone _else."

He did not need to elaborate.

I closed my eyes as he did the same, as he lowered his lips to mine yet again, and our kiss was slow, heated, bespeaking of the feelings we had for one another. He rocked his hips against mine teasingly, hinting at what was yet to come, and silently telling him the wait was over I reached down between our bodies and guided him home. That was what it felt like for me, as we became one. He was where he belonged, in my arms, in my body, in my heart for the rest of time.

We shared eternity that night. I couldn't tell you how long our encounter actually lasted. That's what's so awesome about dreams. We danced the dance as old as time itself for what felt like hours, but in that good, fantasy kind of way. People always joke about songs and poems that mention making love all night long, and how that sort of thing isn't actually all it's cracked up to be in real life, but this _wasn't _real life, and that was the beauty of it. It was my dream, my fantasy, mine and his, and it was everything we'd wanted it to be and more.

I hadn't wanted it to end, and I'm sure, neither had he, but I couldn't stay unconscious forever and so finally we reached the glorious summit of our climb, the crescendo of our symphony. In unison, we cried out, on each of our lips the other's name, like a prayer, a promise, and then I bolted awake, sitting upright in my bed, my body drenched in sweat, my heart threatening to fly out of my chest. It was late morning, based on the light coming in through my window. It took me several moments to catch my breath and get my barrings, and when I finally staggered out of bed, on shaky legs, the first thing I noticed when I caught my reflection in my closet door mirror was the massive hickey on the left side of my neck.

Staring at the mark not in disbelief, but in wonder, it took me a minute, as I fingered the discolored flesh almost reverently, but then getting a hold of myself I said to my empty room, "I had a good time last night."

I wasn't about to regret it; not for a minute.

He appeared in the mirror behind me in that moment; I turned around and he wasn't there, but looking back in the mirror again, there he was, grinning like the cat that ate the canary.

My 'ghost story' addled mind went from likening my situation to a 'Nightmare on Elm Street' moment to a 'Poltergeist III' moment as he did his mirror trick, but neither reference had been scary to me in the slightest as I met his eyes in the mirror and grinned right back. I loved ghosts, I _loved _my ghost lover, and I would _never _be afraid of him or what he could do to me in my sleep.

Or while I was awake.

It was strangely erotic as I watched the reflection of the invisible man behind me lower his head and kiss the side of my neck, seeing nothing beside me through my peripheral vision. I could definitely feel it, though, as his lips and tongue slowly traced the mark he had left on my skin the night before.

I permitted myself to stand there and enjoy it for what felt like forever, my mind blocking out all higher thought as I told myself not to question the moment and just _feel_. Even as the air grew chilly around me his tongue remained hot, something I'd learned took a great deal of concentration and energy on his part, maintaining the ability for 'normal' physical touch. But if it had been pushing his limits in that moment he hadn't shown it, appearing fully as if he were languidly enjoying himself, like it was no exertion at all.

I don't know when I'd closed my eyes, but eventually I noticed it as the sensation of his tongue disappeared, and opening my eyes, there was nobody standing behind me, in the mirror or otherwise.

"Need to rest?" I asked.

"_You wear me out, Woman_..._" _he'd replied teasingly, and I'd laughed, before getting serious.

We'd needed to talk.

"Inuyasha, what...what are we? What _can _we be?"

"_What do you want us to be?" _

"I...I don't know," I'd admitted, "but I do know that I love you, and that right now there's definitely no other guys on my radar, so you've got nothing to be jealous of, but can we _really _make this...thing, work?"

"_If it's what you want, we'll make it work_._" _was his reply, and I'd found myself wishing he'd just tell me what _he _wanted, although, thinking about it logically, he'd already done that last night when he'd suddenly joined me in the shower.

Still, though, I'd needed to make sure he wasn't just thinking with his hormones.

Did ghosts have hormones?

I was confusing myself again.

"But is that fair to _you?_" I'd asked then. "I mean, shouldn't you 'move on' at some point, or whatever? I can't expect you to haunt me _forever_."

"_I already told you, I'm not going anywhere_..._" _

His apparition formed beside me, looking a little transparent, which was understandable since he'd used up a lot of energy.

"...unless you ask me to leave." he'd concluded then, and my heart ached at the look of absolute love mixed with fear in his eyes.

He _wanted _to stay, and he was terrified by the notion of me telling him to leave.

I reached up, as if to touch his face, my hand going right through his cheek and feeling the concentration of cold air. He leaned his face sideways into my touch anyway, as if he could feel me, and perhaps he could.

"I want you to stay. I want to make this work."

The look in his eyes became so passionate, then, and he rushed forward, seemingly pulling me into a hug except he had no form. I gasped at the sensation, like cold electricity had enveloped me, was _inside _of me, and then just as quickly as the icy tingles came they were gone.

"_Need_..._to rest_..._"_

Nodding my understanding, I'd clicked on the space heater in my room for him and then gathered up some clean clothes to take into the bathroom. I'd needed another shower.

~o~o~o~o~o~

We're taking things one day at a time, Inuyasha and I, but just like Souta had said, true love transcends all obstacles. Am I being a complete moron, trying to have some semblance of a 'healthy' relationship with a dead guy? Maybe. But I try to look at things from his perspective. Inuyasha has told me, during quiet talks at night, that he lives in fear, in a manner of speaking, that one day I'll come to my senses; one day I'll realize that I can't have a _real_ life with a ghost, and I'll leave him for somebody else. Somebody living.

Does that mean I'm going to stay with him out of guilt? Of course not.

I'm with him because I want to be. I'm with him because I _love _him. But knowing that he has that fear in the back of his mind reassures me of his own feelings for me in return. It also reassures me that I'm not the only idiot in this relationship; it's yet one more thing we have in common, our shared and _misplaced_ fear.

He has nothing to worry about, and he's assured me of the same, yet the both of us still keep a speck of worry in the back of our minds nonetheless. I worry that he'll get bored, and I also feel guilty for my mortality, since he'll have to watch me grow old while he stays the same, though don't worry, I'd never do something as foolish as kill myself, and he's forbad me from even entertaining the notion. But besides all that, I worry the most that one day he'll leave me because he thinks it's the 'right' thing to do, like he'd be setting me 'free' or some other such nonsense. I've made him promise, reinforcing his own original vow from our first 'morning after' together, that he'll never leave me for _my_ sake, unless I _ask_ him to. If I never tell him that I want us to break up, which I never will, then it means I _don't_ want us to break up. He's not trapped with me, of course, and could tell me one day, if he wanted to, that _he_ wants to leave, but he too has sworn that that'll never happen. The each of us, in our true love for the other person, worry if it might be in the other person's best interest that we call it quits, for their sake, and we're both willing to let the other person go, for their sake, because our love is that strong, while at the same time we're both ordering each other to not _dare_ do something so foolish.

Peas in a pod.

So with each of us trying our best not to focus on that pesky, lingering worry, we're doing our best to pretend we've got a perfectly normal, healthy relationship. I'm pretending my boyfriend is alive, while he, too, is pretending, and experiencing what it's like to still be alive vicariously through me. I've finally mastered the ability to stay asleep even while knowing it's a dream, I think from my strong desire to be with him in my dreams, and he does indeed come to me in my sleep, nearly every single night. Most nights we make love, but sometimes we just talk. Sometimes we go out on a date, eat dinner, watch a movie... They're just imagined experiences taking place solely in our own heads, of course, but they certainly feel real enough at the time, and really, that's all that matters.

My mother knows that Inuyasha and I are together now, and she's told me, perhaps with a bit of motherly worry in her eyes, that she just wants me to be happy and so she'll support whatever decision I make if I feel in my own heart that it's the right one. Grandpa thinks I have a casual, college boyfriend I don't want to talk about, and for the time being I'm letting him think it. Maybe one day I'll confess the whole ghost thing to him, but I'll have to edge into it with baby steps. That's on my back burner of worries, right now. Souta of course is thrilled, and he's promised to keep it a secret. I plan on telling the girls, but I haven't muscled up the courage yet.

So what does the future hold in store for us in the long term? Who knows? All I know is that I love Inuyasha, he loves me, and presently we're in a happy relationship. It's not perfect, but what relationship is? At least, unlike that brief human/ghost romance on the American version of Being Human, Inuyasha can actually _touch_ me, and, at least in my dreams, I can touch him in return. That's better than nothing. Of course, I would have still wanted to be with him even if we couldn't actually _be _together, so I consider it a fun bonus, that I don't have to worry about being physically deprived; I definitely don't feel neglected sexually. He seems to be quite the horn dog, and it's no wonder why, when you think about it, since in my dreams he can experience physical pleasure as well. He's got fifty years of celibacy to make up for.

As far as actually settling down, getting married, raising a family...like I already said I'm a career-minded girl, and having children had never really been on my to-do list in the first place. I'm perfectly content to stay single in the eyes of the world and focus on my profession, instead, and as far as my _secondary _profession goes, of being a therapist for the deceased, while I probably won't go public with it like the father in the Casper movie it's definitely something I can do on the side. I feel confident enough, now, to go to known haunted locations, so my game plan is to start small, spend the night at haunted hotels under the guise of being a regular tourist, and hopefully, with Inuyasha's help, the two of us can get to the bottom of whatever's troubling whomever's haunting the place. We're going to take it one day, and one ghost, at a time, but he's told me that he's proud of me for even _wanting _to do it and that he'll be there with me every step of the way, and at this point in time it's just not something that I can ignore. I'm iffy about labeling myself as a medium, because I do want to be taken seriously as a regular therapist, too, but I'm going to try my best to make it work, and do both. I still have to finish college and get my degree before I can do anything else, obviously, so right now I'm going to focus on my studies during the day, enjoy my nights with Inuyasha, and let whatever happens come my way with open arms. My name is Kagome Higurashi, and my story is just beginning.

_~ Fin ~_


End file.
